Community members desolately gathered at Maffeo Sutton Park to raise awareness and urge government action during one of the deadliest years so far in Nanaimo for drug-poisoning deaths.
On Thursday, Aug. 31, the Nanaimo Community Action Team, along with other community advocacy groups, hosted an International Overdose Awareness Day event at the park’s Lions Pavilion.
“People who use drugs and their allies have been resilient as we continue to see our friends, families and neighbours die. We are continuously demoralized, stripped of our humanity, demonized, stolen from, and tokenized only when it is useful to prove engagement,” said Sarah Lovegrove, chairperson of the community action team. “The ongoing war for pitiful amounts of funding diverts our attention, focusing on infighting and blaming one another, rather than bringing our energy to the task of taking on the systems that are killing us.”
Lovegrove, who’s also a registered nurse, said more than 350 people have died from drug poisoning in Nanaimo since the B.C. government declared the overdose epidemic as a public health emergency in 2016. on Tuesday, the B.C. Coroners Service said 198 people – including 10 in Nanaimo – died in July due to the toxic drug crisis.
READ MORE: 198 people died in B.C. in July due to toxic drug poisonings
Among the speakers at the event was Lenae Silva, a co-founder of the Open Heart Collaborative and a heroin user for 18 years. She said she was tired of having to hold events like this and having to advocate for the right “of our own bodily autonomy.”
“I’ve done this so many times. I just feel like I’m saying the same things over and over and over and it’s exhausting,” said Silva. “We do this work because we have to. The Homelessness Association of B.C.’s funding is being cut. We run Open Heart Collaborative with no money. COVID is done so the funding is done. It’s like we’re disappearing again, we’re going backwards.”
Silva said she and other advocates and community workers are feeling burnout now that funding for community outreach groups is starting to be cut, even though “we know what needs to be done.”
Andrew Paul, a member of Gitga’at First Nation, closed the event with a grieving song passed down from his grandmother, a story about his friends and family’s experience with drugs and alcohol, and a message to politicians, including those who had spoken at Thursday’s event.
“Your actions in the last five years has proved to us as First Nations people, and as Canadians, and just as people, that your words don’t align with your actions, and it’s just nothing but lip service,” he said. “I’m glad you got up here and shared what you had to share, but I’m here to share the truth about what’s really going on. And if that offends some of you government officials, good. I’m glad to give you something to work on when you leave here.”
READ ALSO: Overdose awareness day comes during deadliest year of crisis in Nanaimo
bailey.seymour@nanaimobulletin.com
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