Grande Prairie Mayor added to Minister’s Opioid Emergency Response Commission

Grande Prairie’s Mayor has been added to a provincial team aimed at combatting the opioid crisis. 

After starting his own local driven opioid task force in the city in late 2017, Bill Given will now be part of the Minister’s Opioid Emergency Response Commission as it is extended for another 18-months. 

“By virtue of our role in providing emergency first response, social services, law enforcement, public housing and public education programs, municipalities are on the front lines of the opioid response. Local councils and municipal staff maintain close connections with organizations working in areas such as harm reduction, housing, health, public education and serving vulnerable populations. I look forward to serving on the commission and identifying how we might best leverage these relationships and municipal knowledge to develop and execute interventions that are more comprehensive and appropriate to the local context of communities across the province,” said Given in a release from the province. 

In the first three months of 2018, 158 people died from apparent fentanyl overdoses, three of those from the Swan City area, according to information provided by the province.