Ottawa police, paramedics take fresh approach to ByWard Market

Austin Gionet cruises past Ottawa's ByWard Market building when a woman flags him down.

"I don't like going to the hospital," Thumper tells him. "Once you're a mental patient they treat you like a mental patient as soon as you walk in and I hate that." It's all in response to an overwhelming increase in demand for paramedic services in the ByWard Market. In Ottawa, paramedics transport nearly 70 per cent of the patients they see, but the ByWard Market pilot transports only 38 per cent.

The market medic program is just one of several new initiatives to tackle the opioid crisis plaguing Ottawa's downtown core.hitting eight "hot spots" around the ByWard MarketIt's called the Community Outreach Response and Engagement strategy and is a direct response to concerns expressed by community and business owners.

Since the program was launched Aug. 6, officers have conducted just over 200 foot patrols and logged more than 500 "community engagements," which Stam described as "check-ins with local businesses, interactions with street-involved individuals and conversations with local residents, tourists, and others."

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