Why are you comparing Canadian drug policies to Europe? It would be far better to compare our drug policies with Asian countries who have over 100 years experience in having to live with drug addictions.
In China, for example, every addict is given involuntary drug addiction treatments. Drug importing and dealing are extremely serious criminal offences. Addicts are not allowed to die on the streets.
Our streets are becoming dangerous.
You are right. Are public libraries suppose to be institutions for learning or are they resources for the homeless, the drug addicted and the mentally ill. They can't be both. Pick one or the other. If they don't make the choice, the general public will do it for them by staying away.
Agree with a lot of your response (and always to most of BtN pieces), but not sure comparisons to non-democratic countries like China are a better comparison than some W. European countries. China was also able to quickly and dramatically reduce mortality, esp kids, over a few decades; many millions of kids not starving to death. They didn't need to go through our onerous democratic processes. Not sure we have that 'luxury' in Canada. In addition, some countries such as Finland try to make library spaces truly inclusive and even have some limited sleeping pods for folks. I don't think public spaces should be exclusionary- but they must enforce social contracts that used to include not shooting up near city fountains or in hospital rooms..... this is not a drug issue. It's a function of deeply torn and disintegrating social fabric that causes 'the least among us' to go cuckcoo.
Okay, lets pick Singapore. Recently two young female Italian swimmers, who were in the country for a competition, were caught shoplifting some cosmetics at an airport store. The Italian embassy helped them so all they got was six-months probation and are banned from entering Singapore for life.
Compare that to shoplifting in Canada where paying for items in our stores has become optional. What life lessons are we teaching our young?
By the way, Singapore is a democracy, its offical language is English and it too was a British colony.
Try shop lifting in Japan.
As far as Finland goes, it is so far away, and few here speak or read the language, so it is very difficult to know how successful they are. Nor do they have the same meth and fentanyl drug problems that we have.
If you read the offical reports on BC drug addictions and how the provincial government is responding to it, would not all those reports make it sound like BC is leading the world in drug addition care and Harm Reduction? Sure it would.
I just finished reading a new 95-page report published by the University of Western Ontario and various social agencies in London on the topic of the homeless problems in that city. Only half-of-one page had any information worth reading. The rest was propaganda written with the intent of pushing their agenda.
Another point. The Supreme Court of Canada recently ruled that research materials, surveys and the like written by activist "experts" can be so tainted by bias that they have no place in a court of law.
I completely agree- and this is as an academic!- that reports like the UWO one should be evidence-based/objective, but often aren't even useful as toilet paper on this topic. One government commissioned 'rigorous' program evaluation of so-called safe supply trials had me so apoplectic that I lost count of the 'manys' or 'mosts' after getting to 100. It was so shamelessly biased that I use it as an example of how NOT to do program evaluation in my classes. Thank heavens for scholars/health practitioners such as Julian Somers, Launette Rieb, Sharon Koivu, and Vincent Lam- all incredibly brave and caring people willing to shout into the void until people listen.
The proliferation of ‘safe supply’ drugs was in part due to the Ontario government allowing video terminals in pharmacies. Doctors, sitting at home, in different cities, prescribing to random people in front a screen, is very easy work, and very lucrative. And how much can they really care about diversion of thousands of tablets of Dilaudid 8 mg into other cities-it’s not in their backyard. And those pharmacists? Dispensing this is 30x more lucrative than me and you picking our random prescription every month (because it is an observed dose in the morning with the remainder of the days doses provided as ‘take away’. Have you ever seen the line-ups in the morning in front of these downtown pharmacies? Some individuals might be prescribed 30+ of these pills PER DAY) Of course they’re interested. In the past, only physicians with specialized training in Addiction, and Ontario College of Physicians certification could prescribe the addiction-related medications, in the context of a comprehensive out-patient support program. Now any entrepreneurial doctor (and a few who own actual companies that employ other doctors $$$) can prescribe vast quantities of dangerous medications to 100s of heads on a video screen, in another city, and both they and pharmacists make serious money to do it. Giving individuals in active addiction free access to drugs lures them away from established progress in programs with no mind-altering drugs and no take away doses to sell, and from the support that an in-person environment can provide. The people who work in these live in the community have a vested interest in keeping the individuals and their community healthy and safe. ‘Safe supply drugs’ are not a treatment for addiction, and they are valuable to sell. It’s absolutely ludicrous. Bring back in-person appointments, responsible prescribing of evidence-based treatments (methadone, Suboxone, Sublocade) with trained Specialist physicians. It would go a very long way in reducing inner city problems.
Why are you comparing Canadian drug policies to Europe? It would be far better to compare our drug policies with Asian countries who have over 100 years experience in having to live with drug addictions.
In China, for example, every addict is given involuntary drug addiction treatments. Drug importing and dealing are extremely serious criminal offences. Addicts are not allowed to die on the streets.
Our streets are becoming dangerous.
You are right. Are public libraries suppose to be institutions for learning or are they resources for the homeless, the drug addicted and the mentally ill. They can't be both. Pick one or the other. If they don't make the choice, the general public will do it for them by staying away.
Agree with a lot of your response (and always to most of BtN pieces), but not sure comparisons to non-democratic countries like China are a better comparison than some W. European countries. China was also able to quickly and dramatically reduce mortality, esp kids, over a few decades; many millions of kids not starving to death. They didn't need to go through our onerous democratic processes. Not sure we have that 'luxury' in Canada. In addition, some countries such as Finland try to make library spaces truly inclusive and even have some limited sleeping pods for folks. I don't think public spaces should be exclusionary- but they must enforce social contracts that used to include not shooting up near city fountains or in hospital rooms..... this is not a drug issue. It's a function of deeply torn and disintegrating social fabric that causes 'the least among us' to go cuckcoo.
Okay, lets pick Singapore. Recently two young female Italian swimmers, who were in the country for a competition, were caught shoplifting some cosmetics at an airport store. The Italian embassy helped them so all they got was six-months probation and are banned from entering Singapore for life.
Compare that to shoplifting in Canada where paying for items in our stores has become optional. What life lessons are we teaching our young?
By the way, Singapore is a democracy, its offical language is English and it too was a British colony.
Try shop lifting in Japan.
As far as Finland goes, it is so far away, and few here speak or read the language, so it is very difficult to know how successful they are. Nor do they have the same meth and fentanyl drug problems that we have.
If you read the offical reports on BC drug addictions and how the provincial government is responding to it, would not all those reports make it sound like BC is leading the world in drug addition care and Harm Reduction? Sure it would.
I just finished reading a new 95-page report published by the University of Western Ontario and various social agencies in London on the topic of the homeless problems in that city. Only half-of-one page had any information worth reading. The rest was propaganda written with the intent of pushing their agenda.
Another point. The Supreme Court of Canada recently ruled that research materials, surveys and the like written by activist "experts" can be so tainted by bias that they have no place in a court of law.
I completely agree- and this is as an academic!- that reports like the UWO one should be evidence-based/objective, but often aren't even useful as toilet paper on this topic. One government commissioned 'rigorous' program evaluation of so-called safe supply trials had me so apoplectic that I lost count of the 'manys' or 'mosts' after getting to 100. It was so shamelessly biased that I use it as an example of how NOT to do program evaluation in my classes. Thank heavens for scholars/health practitioners such as Julian Somers, Launette Rieb, Sharon Koivu, and Vincent Lam- all incredibly brave and caring people willing to shout into the void until people listen.
News item today. Campbell River has a of ODs this month due to toxic drugs
The advice, use drugs with friends and test them if you can. RIDICULOUS
How about. STOP USING THESE TOXIC DRUGS OR THEY WILL KILL YOU.. CALL THE POLICE AND TURN IN THE PEOPLE WHO ARE KILLING YOU WITH THESE DRUGS.
We have gone mad. No wonder Mr T has struck a chord in the US.
The proliferation of ‘safe supply’ drugs was in part due to the Ontario government allowing video terminals in pharmacies. Doctors, sitting at home, in different cities, prescribing to random people in front a screen, is very easy work, and very lucrative. And how much can they really care about diversion of thousands of tablets of Dilaudid 8 mg into other cities-it’s not in their backyard. And those pharmacists? Dispensing this is 30x more lucrative than me and you picking our random prescription every month (because it is an observed dose in the morning with the remainder of the days doses provided as ‘take away’. Have you ever seen the line-ups in the morning in front of these downtown pharmacies? Some individuals might be prescribed 30+ of these pills PER DAY) Of course they’re interested. In the past, only physicians with specialized training in Addiction, and Ontario College of Physicians certification could prescribe the addiction-related medications, in the context of a comprehensive out-patient support program. Now any entrepreneurial doctor (and a few who own actual companies that employ other doctors $$$) can prescribe vast quantities of dangerous medications to 100s of heads on a video screen, in another city, and both they and pharmacists make serious money to do it. Giving individuals in active addiction free access to drugs lures them away from established progress in programs with no mind-altering drugs and no take away doses to sell, and from the support that an in-person environment can provide. The people who work in these live in the community have a vested interest in keeping the individuals and their community healthy and safe. ‘Safe supply drugs’ are not a treatment for addiction, and they are valuable to sell. It’s absolutely ludicrous. Bring back in-person appointments, responsible prescribing of evidence-based treatments (methadone, Suboxone, Sublocade) with trained Specialist physicians. It would go a very long way in reducing inner city problems.