21st Century Pain Solutions

EPISODE 24 ft. Guy Felicella – Do you know someone who’s struggled with drugs? Natural addiction hasn’t changed over the centuries; however, the drugs have become more powerful. There’s a cost, not just to the user, but to you, our medical system, and our societies. In the United States seven people die every hour of a drug overdose; and in 2017, that was 72,000 people that died of an overdose crisis in the United States. In British Columbia, four die every day; and in Canada, 11 die every day to a drug overdose. Guy Felicella joins us today to talk about these figures, what we’re doing to bring them down with transitional housing and harm reduction programs, and what else we can do. Guy is a worker with the Vancouver Coastal Health. He works with the homeless – people with poverty issues and with substance abuse in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver – and one big part of his job is working with people regarding harm reduction services in the heart of the opioid cris