The Vice-President of Medical Services for Southern Health expects they could see more emergency room visits when cannabis becomes legal on October 17, one month from today. Dr. Denis Fortier is reacting to word out of Ontario where there has been a large spike in marijuana overdoses in the past year, largely attributed to edible forms of cannabis like cookies or candy. He says Southern Health does not keep statistics on drug overdose cases at its emergency rooms but thinks the Ontario situation should be seen as an alert to others.

Dr. Denis Fortier" None of us really, really understands how the legalization of cannabis is going to affect people. I know there are a lot of people who would have never tried cannabis who are now interested, possibly, in trying the edible format of cannabis. That format is an unpredictable format. It's really hard to predict whether you're taking a little bit, or a lot, or too much. So, we may actually see some increased visits to the emergency room with panic attacks and rapid heart rates and psychosis or some sort of hallucinogenic side effects related to cannabis. In particular, I worry a little bit about the ingestibles."

Dr. Fortier says Southern Health is talking about how to handle these situations.

"We're not formally talking, but I know that it is on everybody's radars. Certainly, we are talking about it. We are even looking at certain policies and procedures in our hospitals as it relates to either using or managing cannabis if it happens to be brought in by patients."

Dr. Fortier says while Manitoba does not keep records of overdoses, there appears to have been an increase in recent years at emergency rooms.

"Anecdotally, because I don't have a lot of hard evidence, anecdotally, over the last ten years, we have seen an increase in drug-related visits to the emergency room."