Cranbrook’s mayor and former fire chief Wayne Price says drug overdoses are affecting people of all walks of life in the community.
He says residents can have misconceptions about the people who are overdosing and dying of overdoses.
“A lot of people see these stats and make an assumption on who they are,” Price said.
“I think what the public has to realize here is that it’s not just people we think who are on the street or homeless. It’s often young, working males. They work up the valley or up north and this is recreational drugs on the weekend.”
Price says these cases can be traumatic for first responders.
“Certainly from my perspective in past dealings with emergency responders, these ones take a lot more of a personal impact,” he added.
“They are much harder on the responders. You go to the same ones often and develop a relationship and sometimes you know you’re just going to go to one and not be able to help anyone.”
Overdoses made up a sizable number of the fire department’s medical calls last quarter.
“We had 524 medical calls which are quite high, it was 74 per cent of our call volume. 81 of those were breathing-related calls and 72 were for overdoses. There is still a lot of work going on on the medical side of things,” said Cranbrook Fire and Emergency Services Director Scott Driver.
Overdoses in the previous quarter were also 72.
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