“Either way, Lori Carr is failing to do her job,” said Betty Nippi-Albright, Saskatchewan NDP Shadow Minister for Mental Health & Addictions. “I hear every day about waitlists for treatment facilities that have hundreds of people on them and individuals reporting waits of weeks, even months, for just an initial assessment.
“That is shameful. People are dying while trying to access healthcare and this Minister won’t even come clean.”
Nippi-Albright plans to ask Minister Lori Carr to release the total number of people waiting for treatment and a breakdown of the waitlist by facility during Question Period later Tuesday.
This comes after questions were already asked to this effect during the Legislature sittings on Nov. 12 and Nov. 13. In both instances, Carr was asked point-blank to provide figures on waitlists in the province and she ducked and dodged them.
Nippi-Albright's call for transparency and a plan to get people the care they need comes as 267 people have died of suspected drug toxicity or drug poisoning this year alone, to the end of October, according to the Saskatchewan Coroner.
There have been at least five drug alerts in recent weeks, including three in Saskatoon alone. Some drugs currently flooding into communities are resistant to the administration of naloxone, making them even more dangerous.
“People know these drugs will kill them and I hear so many horrific stories of people trying to get help to get off these substances but finding no supports,” Nippi-Albright said.
“I will not stand by and do nothing while nearly a person dies every day of drugs in Saskatchewan.
“The Sask. Party has been in power for 18 years and the drug crisis is worse than ever. The people dying are our future and they deserve a government that will do everything it can to save them.”
National Addictions Awareness Week runs Nov. 16-22.
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