By Jill Sperling

Mother of OD victim says more must be done to prevent deaths

Jun 10, 2016 | 4:55 PM

KAMLOOPS — The spate of overdose deaths in B.C. has hit Kamloops harder than any other community. 

Eighteen deaths were recorded in the city between January and May this year. One of those killed was Ryan Pinneo, a young man whose life was cut short by fentanyl. 

His mother, Sandra Tully, is speaking out, saying more must be done to prevent further deaths from happening.

WATCH: Full report by Jill Sperling

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“I think that we’re in an epidemic,” Tully said. “I think that everyone involved, RCMP, Interior Health, the Minister of Health need to really wake up to that.” 

Ryan Pinneo died on Jan. 20, when the pill he thought was OxyContin turned out to be a fatal dose of fentanyl. 

Prior to his overdose, the 22-year-old had tried to get clean, but in the relatively small community of Kamloops, drugs were a haunting presence.

“Even if he was looking for a job, he would say ‘I can’t work there because my dealer’s girlfriend works there. I can’t go to this gym anymore because there’s a guy who deals there,’” Tully said. “And I didn’t realize how big of a problem it was in Kamloops.” 

The problem doesn’t appear to be going away anytime soon, with 18 deaths already recorded in Kamloops in the first five months of the year. 

Patrick McDonald, program supervisor of the Phoenix Centre said that number was alarming. 

“The numbers are off the charts,” McDonald said, “something we haven’t seen for a long time.”

McDonald oversees a youth justice program called Osprey Place, and works with young addicts on a regular basis. 

“The opiate trend is something we’re definitely noticing with our clientele,” McDonald said. “We’re also noticing a real strong interest in change from many of our young people, which makes our work seem obviously very worthwhile.” 

Health Minister, Terry Lake was also able to find a glimmer of hope in what appears to be a devastating situation. 

“The latest figures for May show that in the entire province of British Columbia there were 42 deaths from illicit drug overdoses,” Lake said. “That was the same as May of 2015 and it is the first month where we haven’t seen a large increase over the year before. 

“That gives us some cautious optimism that the measures that we have put in place are starting to take effect, but we have to see … if in fact it is a trend when we look at the June numbers.” 

The data is still troubling for those who work with people struggling with substance abuse. 

“If we see that many people at this younger age doing this we’re in trouble, and we need to come up with some solutions to save peoples’ lives but also to find out what’s causing people to have such a level of despair in their lives that they’re prepared to put themselves at risk of dying just to be able to hide from what they’re feeling,” Bob Hughes, executive director of ASK Wellness, said. 

As a mother grieving the loss of her son, Sandra Tully wants to see the stigma removed from people gripped by addictions. 

“The first time you take a drug that’s a choice,” Tully said. “But when your brain chemicals have been changed, you’re now hooked with this disease and so society needs to change their way of thinking about how addiction is looked at. It is a disease, it needs to be treated as a disease, and we need to have a little bit more compassion.” 

Tully added drugs are changing, and are far more dangerous now than ever before. 

“There’s no safe experimenting anymore, that’s been all taken away by these synthetic drugs. And we’re going to see a higher death toll.”

EXTENDED VIDEO: Full interviews with Sandra Tully, Patrick McDonald and Bob Hughes