Compassion fatigue seems to have hit many of us when it comes to toxic drug deaths.
With the ongoing tragedy of unregulated drug deaths being unrelenting for close to a decade, many of us seem to have reduced feelings of empathy and sensitivity when it comes to the opioid crisis.
The B.C. health officer declared the province’s first public health emergency on April 14, 2016, in “response to an alarming increase in drug-related emergencies and deaths in British Columbia.”
These days, the crisis is often not a hot casual or professional discussion and only makes headlines sometimes.
Like the lobster in a pot analogy, all of us have gotten used to the news of folks in our community dying from toxic drug deaths and overdoses.
This applies to journalists as much as it does to policymakers and residents.
There are only so many ways you can yell “fire!” in other words, before it fails to register as an emergency.
But the thing is, there is still a crisis, and we all need to snap back to attention.
On Oct. 24, the BC Coroners Service revealed that 1,749 people died due to drug toxicity in the first nine months of 2024.
While that is an 8% decrease from 2023, it is still an appalling number of human beings dying.
Many of us in Squamish know someone impacted.
A Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw council public release declaring a Health State of Emergency in March noted that “2023 was one of the most devastating years on record for toxic drug overdoses and overdose deaths” within the Nation.
“The toxic drug overdose crisis we are currently facing has far-reaching consequences, touching every one of us in the community,” the council said.
The Coroners Service doesn’t release data for Squamish specifically, only for the Howe Sound Region; it shows that 46 people died of toxic drug poisoning from 2016 through this August.
Nine of those deaths were last year.
Were people dying from anything other than unregulated drugs, it is hard to imagine the deaths would have been allowed to add up for so long.
This summer, we saw a massive recall of several plant-based drinks after people became ill from listeria; three people died.
The Public Health Agency of Canada investigated; all production at the facility where the toxins originated was stopped. The manufacturing lines were disassembled, and the facility was renovated. Production at the facility could not restart until the necessary corrective measures were taken.
Of course, the solution to the toxic drug crisis is more complex, with more players. But it has also proved more deadly.
One of the cures for crisis fatigue is choosing your battles.
We commit to not looking away from this critical crisis and hope our leaders and readers don’t either.
