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VICTORIA — The British Columbia Regional Council of Carpenters (BCRCC) is taking steps to ensure worker safety on and off-site.

The BCRCC in Victoria is offering naloxone kits and training to its members for free to “save the lives of construction workers, their friends and their loved ones,” reads a news release.

The kits are being provided in partnership with the B.C. ��������ion Industry Rehab Plan’s (CIRP) A Kit in Every Hand initiative.

“According to the CIRP, 55 per cent of all the people who have died in the opioid epidemic are construction workers, a number that has increased a staggering 33 per cent in the last five years,” reads the release.

The project is being piloted in Victoria after Local 1598 union members took action due to the frequency of reported overdoses in the industry.

“It’s just a matter of time (working) in this industry before you know someone who’s died from an overdose. It seems like not long before you know more than you can count,” said union representative Matt Carlow in the release.

The kits and training and free and available to members. The Carpenters’ plan to expand it across the province.

More than 10 kits were distributed in the first week of the pilot.