Amid wildfires and devastation, B.C. pharmacist dispenses medicine—and kindness

Carmen Langdon was about to watch TV with her husband when she saw a friend’s Facebook post rallying the community to help wildfire evacuees from Lytton, B.C.—a village of about 250 residents located just 45 km away from Langdon’s home in Lillooet. “I knew there was a fire in Lytton but we had heard that all evacuees were supposed to go to two other communities,” recalled Langdon, pharmacist and owner of Pharmasave Lillooet, which her parents opened 50 years ago. “So when I saw from my friend’s post that they were brought here to the rec centre and that they need toothbrushes, toothpaste and other necessities, I just ran to the store to pick up what supplies I could get and went straight to the rec centre.” It was Wednesday, June 30 and Langdon had planned to take the next day off work to spend time with her husband and three children. Until she learned that Lytton—one of more than 200 wildfire sites currently blazing in the province—had just burnt down to the ground, forcing residents to flee, many with little more than the clothes on their back. Langdon has been there, done that. In 2009, Lillooet’s roughly 2,300 residents were ordered to leave their homes after a 3,300-hectare fire on nearby Mount McLean started to lick at the edges of town. Langdon quickly set up an impromptu pharmacy and worked with other healthcare professionals to take care of the townspeople’s medical needs. Her efforts that year earned her awards from the B.C. Pharmacy Association and from Pharmacy Practice + Business. When Langdon arrived last Wednesday at the local rec centre where about 150 Lytton residents had taken shelter, she was greeted by one of the nurses she had teamed up with during the 2009 wildfires. “She had recently retired, but now here she was and one of the first things she did was hand me a list of people’s names, dates of birth and cell phone numbers and say to me 'all these people need medication,'” said Langdon. “So I went back to the pharmacy and started working on filling the prescriptions. A friend’s 16-year-old daughter, whose career goal is to become a pharmacist, came to help. While the teen packaged up medications, Langdon checked the list of patients and prescriptions against the provincial pharmaceutical database and called some of the patients to confirm what they needed. Triage was key. Langdon said she focused first on patients with urgent needs, such as the man who relies on fast-acting insulin four times a day and the woman who takes an anti-depressant every night. “Within the first hour, I ran back to the rec centre with these prescriptions and then came back with the rest,” she recalled. “On that first night, I was there until two in the morning, dispensing medications. Then I worked the next day as well as Friday and Saturday, and that took care of most of the patients.” The residents of Lytton weren’t the only ones who took refuge in Lillooet last week. Neighbours from Pavilion and Texas Creek were also taken initially to Lillooet before most evacuees were moved eventually to bigger centres. By the time the evacuees left Lillooet, Langdon had filled an estimated 500 prescriptions. A number of these were for local residents, who were anxious about being without their medications should Lillooet also be evacuated, “Five hundred isn’t really a big number for most pharmacies, but when you’re a small-town pharmacy with limited supplies and your orders aren’t coming in until Monday, it’s pretty challenging,” she said. “There were people who were saying they needed three months’ supply of their medication but it was just a matter of having an honest conversation with them about making sure everyone has access to the medication they need which, in some cases, meant rationing pills until we got more supplies.” Langdon was quick to point out that she wasn’t the only Lillooet pharmacist who went above and beyond to help during this crisis. The town's other pharmacy, an IDA, reversed its decision to close for Canada Day and, in addition to dispensing medications, pitched in with donations of food, water and a total of $500 in $25-vouchers. “We’re so lucky here because of the relationships we have with each other,” said Langdon. “Everyone has been on edge with the thought of having to leave everything behind and seeing our neighbours’ community being destroyed. So for people to be able to connect with their pharmacist–with someone they know and trust–is a big thing, it’s helped them get through this.” A few evacuees have stayed behind, including a woman from Lytton who is living temporarily in Langdon’s home. The woman’s husband had stayed on their farm and she had nowhere to go while she waited to hear whether or not he was safe. Phone lines in the area had been damaged badly and she had no way to communicate with him. “Yesterday when I got home from work she was so excited because she had finally heard from her husband,” said Langdon. “He was safe and the farm hadn’t burned down.” Sheltering a neighbour who needed help was a no-brainer, said Langdon. The same sentiment applies to her donation of supplies to the people who gathered last week at the rec centre in Lillooet. “It just seemed the right thing to do, and I think everyone in the community felt the same way, because by midnight on Wednesday there were loads of clothes and shoes, food, diapers and pillows coming into the rec centre from people in the community,” said Langdon. “When people have had this unfathomable loss, helping them in any way we can is the least we can do.”

Amid wildfires and devastation, B.C. pharmacist dispenses medicine—and kindness

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