The province is looking to decrease the number of recent inmates who die of overdoses in Kamloops.

The Ministry of Health has rolled out transition teams to help get drug treatment for recently-released inmates, consisting of a social worker and a peer who has had drug issues or has been incarcerated.

Correctional medical director Dr. Nader Sharifi says a coroner’s death review panel showed about two-thirds of people who were reviewed in a recent 19-month period died of an illicit drug overdose, totaling 333 people.

“Ten per cent of those who had died in that category died within 30 days of release,” Sharifi says. “That was a number that was significant to us, and we thought we could influence that number and hopefully decrease the number of deaths.”

Sharifi says drug users are vulnerable when they’re released from jail.

“There’s several factors, but one of the most important ones is when you go into custody, you don’t have access to the substances you’re usually getting. So you lose tolerance,” he says.

“When that tolerance is lost and then you’re released back into the community and the cravings haven’t been addressed, then it’s a high-risk time for relapse. Loss of tolerance, the medications, the drugs, the substances will have a greater affect on the body, and you’re at very high risk of overdosing and dying.”

The transition teams are now in Kamloops, Prince George, Surrey, Port Coquitlam and Nanaimo.