Details of Lambton County's recently adopted ten-year drug and alcohol strategy were shared during a media conference on Wednesday.
It's a collaborative approach to tackling the community's concerning opioid trend.
The comprehensive document focuses on three pillars: demand reduction, harm reduction, and supply reduction.
Priorities include reducing the stigma surrounding substance use, addressing mental health and trauma, and creating systems that are easy to navigate.
Lambton Medical Officer of Health Dr. Karalyn Dueck said in 2020, Lambton County had the highest number of opioid-related deaths in history at 43.
"That was during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, and clearly that had an impact on mental health and substance use," said Dr. Dueck. "This strategy has been in the making for some time. Substance use disorders and mental health issues are not new. However, it came to be very clear during the pandemic how critical this issue is. We're coming together as a community now to make progress in changing that trend."
The preliminary estimate for 2021 was 38 opioid-related deaths, and there were 21 between January and October of 2022.
Dr. Dueck said another important thing is to use humanizing terms like "people in recovery" or "people with an addiction" rather than "users," "addicts," or "abusers."
Sarnia-Lambton Rebound is one agency that's playing a key part in the strategy, especially when it comes to dealing with youth.
Executive Director Michelle Holbrook said prevention and early intervention are both very important.
"That's what the demand pillar is really about," said Holbrook. "It's about looking at how we can provide that social connectiveness and provide the education to young people. Rebound has a program called 'Choices' that is specific to education around substance use. We've been one piece of the puzzle in our community, but we need to expand and find out what everyone else is doing. Our first task is finding out what everyone else is doing across the community. Ours is really focused on youth, and this strategy is more about the full lifespan."
Part of the strategy centres around police enforcement.
Constable John Sottosanti is a member of the Sarnia Police Service's Integrated Mobile Police and Crisis Team (IMPACT). He said, for them, it's always been an issue of curtailing the actual supply of drugs.
"Talking with people on the street, there are a number of underlying issues that have pointed them in that direction to find ways to self-medicate," said Sottosanti. "It then can become long standing to the point where it deteriorates their life and then we have issues of homelessness that afflict them. Of course, there's also violence that they have to go through and other crimes that are committed to substantiate the need for these drugs. So, there are a lot of things that have to be brought together. That's why this team approach is being thought of. We have to do something different, we can't keep beating our heads against the wall independent of each other."
"We're kind of, at the very base of it, trying to stream people into the proper direction, rather than just arresting people and charging them, because it's not necessarily working ," he added. "At times there is a need for it, but it's not always working. We're trying to find other avenues, working with our community members, to find solutions."
There will also be a rural focus to the initiative with help from the North Lambton Community Health Centre.
Executive Director Kathy Bresette said they'll look to build on their existing rural strategy.
"We do hit most communities in rural Lambton," said Bresette. "We're going to Alvinston, Watford, Thedford, and we have an apartment that we've rented from Kettle Point that we have set up for people to drop into everyday. Also, in Sarnia-Lambton, we're going to have a mobile bus that's coming. That will have outreach as well to the rural locations locally. We wanted to make sure a rural strategy was incorporated into the work."
Bresette said there's no doubt that more funding is needed from the province when it comes to community health.
"If we look at health promotion and those resources, they have not received the funding level that is going to be needed to deal with the 22 per cent of the population that are going to need more resources. Maybe they've slipped into poverty or homelessness. There has to be a shift toward health promotion," Bresette said.
Lambton County Council endorsed the plan during a meeting on April 5.
