Two Inmates Overdosed at a Yellowknife Prison But Authorities Don’t Know on What

The overdose of two inmates at Yellowknife's only prison last month has prompted a change in the way in the correctional center will attempt to control contraband, according to a spokesperson from Northwest Territories' department of justice.

North Slave Correctional Centre (NSCC), which houses both inmates serving federal and provincial sentences, had two cases of overdose on November 12 via opiates that were smuggled into the prison.

The two men who overdosed were discovered by prison guards, one of whom was taken to hospital. Both inmates made full recoveries and will be facing disciplinary action.

According to NWT department of justice spokesperson Sue Glowach, the prison doesn't have a history of overdoses, nor do they see many opiates brought into the prison.

Glowach noted that it's unclear which drugs were used, as the prison doesn't have the facilities necessary for on-site drug testing, but she did mention that the opiates were ingested and not injected.

"Contraband goes into facilities all across Canada and it will always get in, despite best efforts," she told VICE. "In this particular case, as soon as [NSCC] found the one inmate, they did a complete search of the facility and secured the prison, which is when they found the other."

According to Glowach, the inmates were not on a methadone treatment and such a program is not something commonly offered in NWT.

Like many other provinces, methadone maintenance treatment (MMT)—the medical program used to help relieve addicts of opiate addiction by supplementing illicit substances with the opiate known as methadone—is heavily restricted in NWT prisons and often only offered to inmates who were on the treatment prior to entering prison.

The Office of the Correctional Investigator (OCI) supplied statistics to VICE that showed only two of 67 deaths in federal penitentiaries in 2014-2015 were from overdose. Although it is unclear how many non-fatal overdoses there are, Stacie Ogg, spokesperson for OCI, said that the information is tracked by the Correctional Services of Canada (CSC), it's just not available publicly.

Contraband being smuggled into facilities is a growing problem for Canadian prisons: last year, a CBC News investigation found that there was a 20 percent rise in contraband being brought into prisons. Exact numbers from the CSC show 103 seizures of opiates including heroin, fentanyl, and oxycontin.

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