fentanyl patches

A solution in North Bay could lead to a province wide answer to Fentanyl abuse; so says Nipissing MPP Vic Fedeli.

His private members bill called the Safeguarding Our Communities Act came from a situation in North Bay where local officials wanted to address Fentanyl abuse.

He says they adopted a Patch 4 Patch program meaning to get a new Fentanyl patch you had to return a used Fentanyl patch.

Fedeli says the program is meeting with success because Fentanyl deaths in North Bay are down since the program was launched. He says there are no Fentanyl related deaths in North Bay this year after experiencing an average of two deaths per year in previous years.

Fedeli says the program has also been adopted in 45 other centres but it needs to go province wide thus his bill.  He says the bill has passed 2nd reading and next in the fall the bill will be brought to committee.

After that he says it’ll be up to the government for a vote on 3rd and final reading if it passes committee provided the government brings it up for a vote.

He says his proposal was recently highlighted in Maclean’s magazine.

Fedeli says his party and the NDP are in favor of his bill but the Liberals are lukewarm on it to date.