Thousands of diverted “safer supply” pills seized in major RCMP drug bust

Police say organized crime groups are actively involved in the redistribution of safe supply.

The RCMP announced today that it has seized over 10,000 prescription pills in British Columbia’s interior over the past three months, including a significant amount of hydromorphone and morphine diverted from government-funded “safer supply” programs.

These seizures come amid rising public debate about whether Canada should cancel safer supply, as experts say that these programs are being widely defrauded and exacerbating the national addiction crisis.

According to RCMP Corporal Jennifer Cooper, multiple investigations targeting drug traffickers in the Prince George area led to the seizure of approximately 10,000 pills in December, followed by the seizure of “thousands” of additional pills in February.

Confiscated prescription drugs included Hydromorphone, Oxycodone, Morphine, Codeine, Gabapentin and Dextroamphetamine. Cash and large quantities of suspected fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamine were also discovered.

Although Cooper confirmed in a phone interview that safer supply hydromorphone pills, which are as potent as heroin, constituted a “significant” portion of the total haul, she was unable to say exactly how many of them had been seized, as doing so could jeopordize ongoing investigations.

By checking any prescription labels still attached to the drugs, the RCMP was able to confirm that much of the hydromorphone and morphine recently confiscated in Prince George originated from safer supply and was not prescribed for other reasons. As the drug traffickers caught in the recent raids were not the patients indicated on these prescriptions, it was obvious that diversion was occurring.

The public announcement of these seizures comes just one week after the RCMP announced that it had discovered a further 3,500 diverted safer supply hydromorphone pills on Vancouver Island after executing a search warrant.

According to addiction experts, just two or three of these pills is enough to induce a fatal overdose in an opioid-naive user and, when mixed with alcohol, even just a single pill can be fatal.

According to Cooper, safer supply is only “perpetuating the cycle of dependence and violence,” as clients routinely sell their free drugs at low prices to purchase stronger street substances.  She said that the money made by diversion is not enough to dissuade safer supply clients from engaging in crime, and recalled clients selling weeks worth of their prescriptions for relatively small amounts of illicit drugs.

The Prince George RCMP currently believes that safer supply programs are perpetuating the illicit drug trade and significantly increasing the profits of drug dealers. “Organized crime groups are actively involved in the redistribution of safe supply and prescription drugs, some of which are then moved out of British Columbia and resold,” stated Cooper in the media release announcing the recent busts.

Cooper said that the existence of interprovincial safer supply trafficking was confirmed “through ongoing investigations that involve other departments and other police agencies,” but she was unable to provide more precise details without jeopordizing these investigations.

These findings are consistent with testimonials provided by addiction physicians, former drug users and current online drug dealers, who have all spoken candidly about how gangs and other organized criminals traffic diverted safer supply across Canada.

The Prince George RCMP currently believes that, once safer supply drugs enter the black market, they likely end up in the hands of youth. Officers are aware of the fact that hydromorphone is showing up in high schools, and, while it is difficult to conclusively draw a connection to safer supply, Cooper says that youth “have to be getting it from somewhere” and that trafficked safer supply pills clearly have to have some end user.

According to Cooper, youth seem more open to experimenting with safer supply drugs, which are highly addictive and dangerous, because they are “under the false belief that it's safe, because it's a prescription drug.” She said that safer supply was putting teenagers in a “risky situation” with “fake and false information” about the harms of experimenting with what is essentially pharmaceutical heroin.

Harm reduction activists, along with high level figures in the B.C. and federal governments, have often downplayed safer supply diversion or dismissed it as a fairytale. For example, Ya’ara Saks, the federal minister of mental health and addictions, recently told the Canadian Press that criticisms of safer supply are unfounded and rooted in “stigma and fear.”

Yet a recent report produced by B.C.’s top doctor confirmed last month that safer supply diversion is a “common occurrence” that is causing the province’s clinicians “significant distress.” Many clinicians have reportedly “stopped or substantially reduced their prescribing” of safer supply due to the harms it creates among patients and communities.

Cooper said that she and her colleagues are seeing diversion in “large quantities” and that, “Clearly, it’s not a myth.” She believed that Canadians need to give safer supply a “sober second glance” because it  “clearly is not being used in the way it was intended.”