Despite the warnings and efforts to educate the public, the number of suspected opioid deaths in Waterloo Region continues to rise.
Opioids are suspected in 11 deaths and an additional 79 non-fatal suspected overdoses during the month of May.
Waterloo Regional Police are calling the newly released numbers for 2019 alarming.
They say there's been a total of 39 opioid-related deaths in the region so far this year.
That number is especially concerning when compared to last year’s numbers.
A total of 53 people died in Waterloo Region due to an overdose in 2018.
Police say the majority of opioid overdose calls come from residential homes.
"They are not in shelters, they are not on the corner, they are not under a bridge somewhere," says Robert Crossan, the deputy chief of Waterloo Regional Paramedic Services. "It's sort of hard medicine to give to people. But this stuff is happening in your neighbourhood, to your neighbours."
At Grand River Hospital in Kitchener, workers in the emergency room treated an average of 18 overdoses a month.
"So you can imagine three to four physicians, three to four nurses being held on this individual for 15 to 12 minutes," says Dr. Russell Uppal. "It backs up the rest of the ER, backs up the other sick patients. And it's just more and more burden on the health care system."
Across the province more than 1,300 people died of a suspected opioid overdose last year.
Fentanyl is believed to be responsible for the vast majority of those deaths.
