often the heat victims, nearly all senior citizens , were home alone. sometimes out-of-town family members had phoned police to say they could not reach elderly loved ones.
the calls quickly ramped up. by july 1, 445 people in b.c. had succumbed to intense heat, representing a large portion of the 569 heat-related deaths between june 25 and july 29, when temperatures hit as high as 48c in the interior.
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in june, income assistance payments were issued on the 23rd, and that typically leads to a spike in overdoses for several days. then the heat wave started on june 25. the combined overdose and heat emergencies contributed to the 815 deaths in the final week of the month — an incomprehensible figure when the average number of deaths between june 25 and july 1 in recent years has been less than 200.
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in 2016, b.c.’s provincial health officer declared the overdose crisis a public health emergency, and lapointe had hoped that would bring about immediate change. in the years since, she has joined other voices persistently lobbying for easy access to a safe drug supply, decriminalization of possession of drugs, and better and broader treatment options.
in july, b.c. promised to become the first province to provide a permanent access to safe drug supply , which is an important step, but the ndp government continues to be criticized for taking a long time and not going far enough.
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just a month later, in august, lapointe announced that overdoses had now become the leading cause of death for young people age 19 to 39 in b.c.
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next week, lapointe said she will release some early findings about the basic demographics of the 569 heat dome victims. the coroners service has already released some preliminary data that showed 90 per cent of the victims were 60 years or older ; half of them lived in the fraser health authority, with the next largest group coming from vancouver coastal health; and that the most deadly days were june 29 (301 victims), june 28 (147), and june 30 (130).
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