If you’re feeling grief, anxiety or stress around disasters and health emergencies, you’re not alone.

This factsheet is updated with current information on the overdose crisis in B.C., including provincial actions, statistics and announcements.

British Columbia is in the midst of two major public health emergencies. The first is the on-going overdose crisis, and while overall death rates have started to come down, it continues to take a heart-breaking toll on families and communities across B.C. The second, of course, is the COVID-19 pandemic, which has drastically changed all our lives.

Watching a young person struggle with mental health or addictions challenges is a parent’s worst nightmare. We all want to see our children thrive. And yet when they need help, families in crisis have had to struggle to navigate a fragmented system that doesn’t get their kids the care they need. There are waitlists to navigate, expensive bills to pay and doors that seemingly lead nowhere.

Mental-health and substance-use challenges and disorders can happen to anyone, affecting people of all ages, income levels, professions and social classes.

The stories of people taken by the overdose crisis come from every corner of the province. A forestry worker in the North who became addicted to painkillers for a workplace injury and then turned to street drugs. Friends celebrating after a wedding in the Interior. Suburban parents who left behind young children. Middle-aged men who were clean and sober for years.

Last week I met Don, a carpenter who became addicted to painkillers after an injury he got on the job. He ended up on the streets, and says he was in and out of the hospital about 100 times over a period of four years.