Calls for addiction withdrawal help get louder

Leaders with Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) have brought their fears over the impending prescription drug withdrawal crisis to Ontario’s capital.
NAN held a press conference in Toronto on Feb. 29 to explain the plight facing northern communities as oxycodone is taken off the market.
Medical officials and First Nations leaders say the effect on communities of mass withdrawal will be dire, not only on addicts but on children, elders and the community as a whole.
“We don’t have the necessary resources to be able to handle the problem we anticipate happening,” said NAN deputy grand chief Mike Metatawabin.
Metatawabin emphasized that the withdrawal issue is not only a health crisis. He noted that in one community, as an example, there are 26 band members undergoing treatment. Of those 26 people, 18 are mothers with 52 children between them.
“This is also going to have social impacts,” Metatawabin said. “If most of the adult population is going to treatment we’re going to have children we need to think about.”
The issue of prescription drug abuse in First Nations communities has been on NAN’s agenda for years. The organization declared a state of emergency across all NAN First Nations in 2009. It flared up again earlier this year when Cat Lake First Nation declared its own state of emergency, saying that over 70 per cent of the community was addicted to prescription drugs.
Ontario and the federal government have responded by delisting oxycodone from drug benefits plans and setting up restrictions on doctors prescribing the drugs to patients. Those restrictions started in mid-February and will be fully implemented over the coming year.
But the action by the government has been met with concern from First Nations leaders, who say emergency planning on the withdrawal symptoms facing large portions of communities when the supply of oxycodone dries up has not happened.
NAN has previously sent the government a list of the resources needed to help communities through the withdrawal period, including implementation of NAN’s prescription drug addiction framework, opiod treatment programs, better access to Suboxone in First Nations communities, increased medical, nursing and mental health professionals and increased police and security resources.
Now the leaders have brought their message to Toronto, with hope that the provincial and federal governments will take note if national media keeps the pressure on.
“(Going to Toronto) is the only time that we get noticed by everybody involved in decision making,” Metatawabin said. “We’ve tapped into the mainstream media now and hopefully that will bring attention to our current crisis.”