Addictions
Why can’t we just say no?
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From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
Drug use and violence have become common place in hospitals. Drug-addicted patients openly smoke meth and fentanyl, and inject heroin. Dealers traffic illicit drugs. Nurses are harassed, forced to work amidst the toxic fumes from drugs and can’t confiscate weapons. In short, according to one nurse, “We’ve absolutely lost control.”
“Defining deviancy down” is a cultural philosophy that emerged in the United States during the 1990s.
It refers to society’s tendency to adjust its standards of deviancy “down,” so that behaviours which were once unacceptable become acceptable. Over time, this newly- acceptable behaviour can even become society’s norm.
Of course, the converse must also be true — society looks down on those who label social behaviours “wrong,” deeming them moralistic, judgemental or simply out of touch with the realities of modern life.
Thirty years later, this philosophy is entrenched in British Columbia politics and policies. The province has become a society that cannot say “no” to harmful or wrong behaviours related to drug use. It doesn’t matter if you view drug use as a medical issue, a law-and-order issue, or both – we have lost the ability to simply say “no” to harmful or wrong behaviour.
That much has become abundantly clear over the past two weeks as evidence mounts that BC’s experiment with decriminalization and safe supply of hard drugs is only making things worse.
A recently-leaked memo from BC’s Northern Health Authority shows the deleterious impact these measures have had on BC’s hospitals.
The memo instructs staff at the region’s hospitals to tolerate and not intervene with illegal drug use by patients. Apparently, staff should not be taking away any drugs or personal items like a knife or other weapons under four inches long. Staff cannot restrict visitors even if they are openly bringing illicit drugs into the hospital and conducting their drug transactions in the hallways.
The public was quite rightly outraged at the news and BC’s Health Minister Adrian Dix quickly attempted to contain the mess by saying that the memo was outdated and poorly worded.
But his facile excuses were quickly exposed by publication of the very clearly worded memo and by nurses from across the province who came forward to tell their stories of what is really happening in our hospitals.
The President of the BC Nurses Union, Adriane Gear, said the issue was “widespread” and “of significant magnitude.” She commented that the problems in hospitals spiked once the province decriminalized drugs. In a telling quote, she said, “Before there would be behaviours that just wouldn’t be tolerated, whereas now, because of decriminalization, it is being tolerated.”
Other nurses said the problem wasn’t limited to the Northern Health Authority. They came forward (both anonymously and openly) to say that drug use and violence have become common place in hospitals. Drug-addicted patients openly smoke meth and fentanyl, and inject heroin. Dealers traffic illicit drugs. Nurses are harassed, forced to work amidst the toxic fumes from drugs and can’t confiscate weapons. In short, according to one nurse, “We’ve absolutely lost control.”
People think that drug policies have no impact on those outside of drug circles – but what about those who have to share a room with a drug-smoking patient?
No wonder healthcare workers are demoralized and leaving in droves. Maybe it isn’t just related to the chaos of Covid.
The shibboleth of decriminalization faced further damage when Fiona Wilson, the deputy chief of Vancouver’s Police Department, testified before a federal Parliamentary committee to say that the policy has been a failure. There have been more negative impacts than positive, and no decreases in overdose deaths or the overdose rate. (If such data emerged from any other healthcare experiment, it would immediately be shut down).
Wison also confirmed that safe supply drugs are being re-directed to illegal markets and now account for 50% of safe supply drugs that are seized. Her words echoed those of BC’s nurses when she told the committee that the police, “have absolutely no authority to address the problem of drug use.”
Once Premier David Eby and Health Minister Adrian Dix stopped denying that drug use was occurring in hospitals, they continued their laissez-faire approach to illegal drugs with a plan to create “safe consumption sites” at hospitals. When that lacked public appeal, Mr. Dix said the province would establish a task force to study the issue.
What exactly needs to be studied?
The NDP government appears to be uninformed, at best, and dishonest, at worst. It has backed itself into a corner and is now taking frantic and even ludicrous steps to legitimize its experimental policy of decriminalization. The realities that show it is not working and is creating harm towards others and toward institutions that should be a haven for healing.
How quickly we have become a society that lacks the moral will – and the moral credibility – to just to say “no.”
Susan Martinuk is a Senior Fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy and author of Patients at Risk: Exposing Canada’s Health-care Crisis.
Addictions
Poilievre attacks decriminalization of hard drugs with Safe Hospitals Act
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New release from the Conservative Party
The Hon. Pierre Poilievre, Leader of Canada’s Common Sense Conservatives, announced his plan today to ban dangerous weapons and drugs and punish those who harm doctors and nurses.
The Problem:
After nine years, Justin Trudeau’s radical experiment of decriminalizing hard drugs has failed. Since Trudeau formed government, over 42,000 Canadians have died from drug overdoses. Nanaimo, for example, has seen a nearly 400 percent increase in drug overdose deaths in the last four years alone, yet Trudeau decided to allow opioids, cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine to be used in public places like hospitals and parks anyway.
The results of this experiment have been catastrophic. Chaos and disorder have reigned free in public spaces across British Columbia. Our once-safe hospitals are being destroyed by criminals and hard drugs, with the B.C. Nurses Union ringing the alarm bell, saying that patients and staff have been exposed to harmful, illegal drugs. The BC Nurses Union also reported that meth was being smoked in a unit just hours after the birth of a newborn baby. In northern British Columbia, the public health agency put out a memo telling hospital staff to allow patients to bring knives and other weapons into hospitals.
Life became so miserable that BC’s radical NDP Premier asked Justin Trudeau to walk back parts of his wacko decriminalization policy. But the Liberals haven’t learnt from their mistakes.
The Cause:
Two years ago, the Liberal Government granted the BC NDP Government’s request to allow hard drugs across the province, including in public spaces. In the first year of this reckless experiment, 2,500 Canadians died from drug overdoses. Meanwhile, community spaces like soccer fields, hospitals and city squares have been devastated by crime and disorder.
But Justin Trudeau refuses to rule out the requests from Toronto Public Health and the City of Montreal to allow hard drugs in Canada’s two largest cities. He also won’t say whether hard drugs should be allowed in children’s parks, hospitals and public transit. On top of this, the Liberal Minister of Mental Health refuses to acknowledge that their dangerous experiment was a failure.
The Solution:
Common Sense Conservatives will not allow this devastating experiment to play out in other Canadian communities. Canadians deserve a government that will keep hard drugs out of hospitals and will protect staff and patients. We will:
- Create an aggravating factor for the purposes of sentencing if a criminal has a weapon in a hospital.
- End the Health Minister’s power to grant exemptions under s.56 of the Controlled Drug and Substances Act if the exemption would allow people to use dangerous illicit drugs like fentanyl and meth in hospitals. This means that even if Trudeau grants Toronto and Montreal’s request to decriminalize hard drugs, our hospitals will be protected.
- Immediately pass Common Sense Conservative MP Todd Doherty’s Bill C-321, which will create an aggravating factor for assault committed against healthcare workers or first responders.
To be clear, the ban would not apply to any drugs prescribed by medical practitioners like doctors and nurses.
The Safe Hospitals Act will stop some of the insanity that Justin Trudeau and the NDP have unleashed on Canadians with their plan to decriminalize the public use of hard drugs everywhere in Canada. A Poilievre government will ban hard drugs, stop giving out taxpayer-funded opioids, and reinvest that money in treatment and recovery so we can bring home our loved ones drug-free.
Poilievre said:
“Justin Trudeau’s decriminalization experiment has failed. It has resulted in death, misery and destruction across British Columbia, while our hard-working nurses live in fear of inhaling dangerous drugs or being attacked by criminals.
“Instead of learning from this catastrophic mistake, Trudeau has doubled down. He’s refusing to reject Toronto and Montreal’s request to allow hard drugs like fentanyl and heroin to be used in Canada’s two biggest cities.
“Common Sense Conservatives will keep doctors, nurses and patients safe, even if Justin Trudeau won’t. The Liberals and NDP must vote for this common sense Bill until we can form a government that ends this deadly hard drug decriminalization experiment for good.”
Addictions
Liberals shut down motion to disclose pharma payments for Trudeau’s ‘safe supply’ drug program
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Liberal MP Majid Jowhari
From LifeSiteNews
The motion comes as RCMP testified in April that Trudeau’s taxpayer funded ‘safer supply’ drugs are being diverted to the black market.
Liberal Members of Parliament (MPs) resisted a motion to disclose payments made to pharmaceutical companies for “safe supply” opioids.
During a May 15 session in the House of Commons, Liberal MPs blocked a vote on a motion by Conservative MP Garnett Genuis to publish the contacts between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government and pharmaceutical companies for “safe supply” opioids.
“Allow the public to see the contracts,” Genuis told the Commons government operations committee, questioning, “What do you have to be afraid of?”
“There are contracts involving this government and big pharmaceutical companies involved in producing and selling dangerous hard drugs which then end up on our streets,” he argued.
“Big pharmaceutical companies are involved in supplying hard drugs that are used as part of the government’s so-called ‘safe supply’ program,” Genuis continued. “These programs are a failure. We oppose them. In any event, we believe the public has a right to see the contracts.”
However, a committee vote on his motion was quickly blocked by Liberal MPs.
“I don’t think this is a motion we should move forward with,” Liberal MP Majid Jowhari said.
“I think we should go back and look at it and say our objective is to get an understanding of the source of safe supply and how it is being procured, which is different than going and saying, ‘Give us all the contracts,’” he continued.
Similarly, Liberal MP Irek Kusmierczyk claimed the request was a political tactic, saying, “They are against safe supply and safe consumption sites. That is clearly spelled out by my Conservative colleagues.”
Genuis’ request comes as the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) testified in April that Trudeau’s taxpayer funded “safer supply” drugs are being diverted to the black market.
“Organized crime groups are trafficking not only illicit substances but any prescription drugs they can get their hands on,” Deputy Commissioner Dwayne McDonald, commander of the RCMP in British Columbia, testified.
Genuis put forward a motion asking that the committee “order the production of all contracts, agreements or memoranda of understanding to which the Government of Canada is a party signed since January 1, 2016” concerning the purchase of opioids.
Liberals’ refusal to release the contracts comes as the Trudeau government recently rejected a proposal from the Alberta government to add a “unique chemical identifier” to drugs offered to users under “safe-supply” programs so that authorities could track its street sales.
Indeed, the Trudeau government seems determined to pretend their “safe-supply” programs are a success despite the rising deaths and crime in cities that have adopted their policy.
However, the program proved such a disaster in British Columbia that the province recently requested Trudeau recriminalize drugs in public spaces. Nearly two weeks later, the Trudeau government announced it would “immediately” end the province’s drug program.
Beginning in early 2023, Trudeau’s federal policy, in effect, decriminalized hard drugs on a trial-run basis in British Columbia.
Under the policy, the federal government began allowing people within the province to possess up to 2.5 grams of hard drugs without criminal penalty, but selling drugs remained a crime.
Since being implemented, the province’s drug policy has been widely criticized, especially after it was found that the province broke three different drug-related overdose records in the first month the new law was in effect.
The effects of decriminalizing hard drugs in various parts of Canada has been exposed in Aaron Gunn’s recent documentary, Canada is Dying, and in U.K. Telegraph journalist Steven Edginton’s mini-documentary, Canada’s Woke Nightmare: A Warning to the West.
Gunn says he documents the “general societal chaos and explosion of drug use in every major Canadian city.”
“Overdose deaths are up 1,000 percent in the last 10 years,” he said in his film, adding that “(e)very day in Vancouver four people are randomly attacked.”
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