Volunteer helps to safeguard drug users

Ferdi Bezuidenhout is earning his angel wings volunteering to help homeless people and street drug users in Lloydminster stay safe and kick the habit when they are ready to.

Ross from the Midwest Indigenous Society hand out harm reduction supplies to street users and addicts.

He is also one of the first new non-Indigenous members of the Society known as Indigenous allies.

In addition, he helps local Society president Crystal Miller regarding the housing development for Métis, nonstatus and status Indians in Saskatchewan.

risks there.”

They also give out pipes and other sanitized drug paraphernalia along with meals and referral assistance to other social services.

Bezuidenhout says heroin, cocaine and meth are the most common illegal drugs in Lloydminster, but he cautions, the problem is, it keeps on changing.

Bezuidenhout is a full-time WPD Ambulance paramedic who spends his off hours helping Tawaw Outreach workers, Jessica Falcon and Heather

“We do some harm reduction on the weekends and the week as well. It depends on the requirement on the streets,” said Bezuidenhout.

“We basically give out clean supplies, needles, and we take the used needles, so we are reducing some

“There’s a new one that comes from the U.S. called ‘Tranq’ that’s really high risk for everybody,” he said.

Tranq is a dangerous large animal tranquilizer called Xylazine found in fentanyl and other street drugs.

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