Title : Workers at Vancouver overdose prevention site help deliver baby
link : Workers at Vancouver overdose prevention site help deliver baby
Workers at Vancouver overdose prevention site help deliver baby
CTVNews.ca Staff</span>
Published Saturday, June 16, 2018 10:00PM EDT
Last Updated Saturday, June 16, 2018 10:03PM EDT
Two workers at the Maple Overdose Prevention Site in Vancouver’s troubled Downtown Eastside neighbourhood helped a young mother give birth in an alley Thursday afternoon.
Maple Overdose Prevention Site peer supervisors Kevin Thompson and Cynthia Bell work in the area, known for homelessness, drug use and violence.
The job often requires them to think quickly in emergency situations, but neither expected what happened Thursday afternoon.
“Someone came in screaming that there was a lady in labour outside,” Thompson told CTV News.
Bell quickly rushed into a nearby alley where a young woman was in labour next to a dumpster. She immediately called 911.
“The baby's head was already out … so we laid her down,” Bell said. “I was just as scared as she was and it was her first baby, so I imagine she was pretty terrified.”
Someone soon grabbed blankets and a crowd began to form around the woman.
“Everyone was reassuring her, holding her hand, letting her know everything was okay,” Bell recalled. “Any one of those drug addicts would have stepped up and protected her or calm her down.”
Thompson ran out to help guide paramedics to the alley, but the baby wasn’t going to wait for them.
“She got stuck from just past her shoulders down and she was on her side, not crying or breathing,” Bell said.
Bell quickly turned the baby.
“I panicked and yelled at her to push and push hard,” she said. “And she did and that’s when the baby came out in that last push and I caught the baby.”
When the little baby girl began to cry, the crowd started applauding.
“It’s the most amazing thing you'll ever see,” Thompson said. “It was beautiful.”
Bell added that the mother thanked her before she and her newborn were rushed to hospital.
“After all the deaths and overdoses from the fentanyl crisis, it's nice to see someone giving life,” Bell said.
According to a recent report from the Coroners Service of British Columbia, Vancouver has recorded the highest number of illicit drug overdose deaths in the province this year. From January to the end of April, 511 illicit drug overdose deaths have been reported in B.C.
Those numbers seem to suggest that 2018 will be on par with 2017, which saw a record 1,449 illicit drug overdose deaths. In 2017 and 2018, fentanyl was believed to be a factor in more than 80 per cent of all such deaths in B.C.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Michele Brunoro
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