Concerning rise in number of COVID-19 hospitilizations

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New data on COVID-19 shows a concerning rise in the number of people hospitalized. Today, there are 22 people in hospital due to the virus. That's close to triple the number from one week ago. There are 58 new cases of COVID-19 confirmed over the past 24 hours, including 2 in Island Health. Currently, there are 18 active cases of coronavirus in our health region and 925 province-wide. There have been no new deaths from the virus since yesterday.
Meanwhile, more people have died from drug overdoses in BC than from suicide, murder, motor vehicle accidents and COVID-19 combined. The BC Coroner's service reports 176 people suffered fatal overdoses in July. In Nanaimo, there were four overdose deaths, bringing this year's total to 24. That's just three shy of the total number of overdose deaths in Nanaimo for all of 2019. You can read more about the coroner's report on overdose deaths on our website.
Part of BC's response to the overdose crisis has been to give physicians the ability to prescribe safe alternatives like hydromorphone. But, that program has been stymied because of the reluctance of many physicians to write those prescriptions. BC's provincial health officer says the province is looking at expanding the program to allow others like nurse practitioners or pharmacists to prescribe safe alternatives. Dr. Bonnie Henry says new guidelines are coming within weeks, but at least one harm reduction specialist is urging the province to include more drugs in that safe supply. Guy Felicella from the BC Center on Substance Use says hydromorphone is not a viable alternative for users of cocaine or methamphetamines.
"We need to give drug users not the least sought after drugs but the drugs they're actually seeking, in order to remove people completely from the toxic drug supply and not partially. And I think our challenge is what we are doing is not working."—Guy Felicella, BCCSU Peer Clinical Advisor.
Dr. Henry says the province is looking at adding injectable hydromorphone to its alternative supply. She says it's been difficult to get prescription heroin because it is not manufactured in Canada.
The Victoria man who was fined $2300 dollars for violating COVID-19 party rules last weekend says he plans to fight the ticket. 20 year old Nate Christian told CHEK news he was following COVID-safety guidelines.
"I gave everybody hand sanitizers. I took everybody's names down and I showed the cops that but they did not care. They're like 'yeah, you're getting a ticket.'"—Nate Christian
Victoria police say they fined Christian after two warnings and when they entered his one-bedroom apartment, they found the windows fogged up and 30 guests who were sweating from being in such a confined space. Christian admits the only rule he failed to follow was the one about physical distancing. He says he has been evicted from his apartment.