First responders in Windsor-Essex are hoping a new opioid strategy eases the challenges they face.
It's based on four pillars: Prevention and Education; Harm Reduction; Treatment and Recovery and Enforcement and Justice.
Police and EMS are usually first to deal with someone who is overdosing on the drug. Essex Windsor EMS Chief Bruce Krauter says hospital and emergency room overcrowding add to the problem.
"That also impacts on the opioid issue and the mental health issue because as people get frustrated, meaning the patients and the community and they get pushed back into the community without any resources they're only going to get reaffected and use opioids," he says.
His paramedics attest to the fact this is not simply a street drug issue.
"We can have an issue in the suburbs, in the county, in the downtown city. We can have it in the back alley and we can have it in somebody's 3-bedroom, 2-storey house. It's multi-facetted," says Krauter.
Windsor Police Chief Al Frederick says while crime rates are generally stable, their calls are increasing dramatically.
"Overdose calls for service mental health calls for service. We're seeing a rise in complexity and those calls are not half an hour at scene. When we transport someone to hospital or cause that person to be transported that's hours of police officers' time."
Chief Frederick is holding back on having officers carry Naloxone to reverse a drug overdose.
He says a lack of training is part of the issue, but the fear an officer will be subjected to an SIU probe in such a case is not right and needs to be addressed first.