Image Credit: CFJC Today

By Adam Donnelly

OPIOID CRISIS

Lillooet man does his part to limit illicit drug overdoses in small communities

Oct 1, 2020 | 4:18 PM

KAMLOOPS — Overdose deaths in the first eight months of 2020 have now surpassed the total deaths for all of 2019. One of the major issues drug users in the province face is an increasingly toxic supply of drugs, a problem made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic.

A mental health and addictions worker with the Ts’kw’aylaxw First Nation is trying to help reduce those deaths, through a simple solution: a cheap test kit, that allows drug users to see if there is fentanyl in their drugs before they use them.

It’s a simple and inexpensive solution to a problem devastating communities across our province. Rick Aleck has put together the drug testing kits for $1.25. The test strips are meant to detect fentanyl when it’s been mixed with other drugs.

“Any type of drug. Could be heroin, could be cocaine, could be any kind of opioids,” Aleck explains. “It’ll actually tell you if there’s fentanyl in there.”

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Aleck knows the toll years of substance use can take on a person. He’s a survivor of the Kamloops Indian Residential School and says he used to substances to dull the pain of that experience.

“That building over there. Thirteen years in that building over there. That’s me,” Aleck says. “There’s a lot of issues in there. That’s why you drink and do drugs, is to kind of forget things.”

Aleck has been clean and sober for over three decades, thanks to a stop at the Round Lake Treatment Centre near Vernon. He’s been serving his community as a mental health and addictions worker, based in Lillooet. That community has one of the highest rates of illicit drug toxicity deaths in the province since 2018, based on the population of the area.

“There’s very little services, especially in a small town,” Aleck says. “There’s five reserves around Lillooet. We’re pretty close to the coast, so the drugs flow pretty well freely in there.”

In a recent interview with Global B.C., Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry spoke about what could be done to help slow the number of deaths from illicit drug overdoses. She’s advocating for a safe drug supply, as well as decriminalizing drug possession, to reduce the number of deaths resulting from toxic drugs

“It’s about people,” Dr. Henry explains. “It’s about not putting people who use drugs into the criminal justice system. Many people who are using drugs are doing it to address deep-seated, deep-rooted pain.”

Aleck agrees; it’s the cost of the lives lost to the opioid crisis that he wants to cut down on, and he believes these testing kits are a good place to start.

“The biggest hope that I’ve got is to save lives,” Aleck says. “Especially in the smaller towns. We need help. The bigger city’s programs don’t work for us, because we don’t have no resources.”

Aleck has purchased and assembled the kits himself. For more information, or to get some testing kits, you can reach him by email at ricky@tskwaylaxw.com.