The BC Coroners Service would like to see more efforts made for safe supply of opioids, to try and curb the opioid crisis.

Chief coroner Lisa Lapointe made that comment last week when announcing 159 people died of a drug overdose in June, making a record-high 1,011 fatal overdoses in the first half of this year.

“There is reluctance among clinicians to prescribe, and that is a significant challenge right now… And that reluctance I think comes from a place of not wanting to get involved. Certainly not wanting to do more harm.”

Lapointe says many fear that people may then sell their prescriptions on the street. But she says the BC Coroners Service isn’t seeing prescriptions being sold at street level.

“The black market is a pyramid scheme,” she says, referencing the alternative to safe supply for people using drugs. “So those that use substances are encouraged to sell substances so that they can make money to buy more substances. And at the end of the day, the only people who profit off of this are drug traffickers, who are making millions of off the misery of our family and friends.”

And having enough clinicians who are able to prescribe safe opioids is also a challenge, Lapointe says.

“There are a number of trained physicians, and nurse practitioners are actually being trained at BCCSU, BC Centre for Substance Use. But nowhere near the numbers that we need as a province in order to provide safe supply.”

The coroners service says more than 85 per cent of fatal overdoses this year have involved fentanyl, while almost 60 per cent are dying after using alone at home and almost 80 per cent of total people dying are men.

In Kamloops, there were 32 fatal overdoses reported in the first half of this year, which means the city could see another record-high year of losses. In 2020, there were a record 60 people lost to drug overdoses.

Kamloops mayor Ken Christian and RCMP Supt. Syd Lecky are among local voices who have voiced support for safe supply.