Ottawa, Ontario October 6, 2022
ALERT
Trudeau’s Scandalous Drug Policies
Drug addiction and deaths from drug overdose continue to rise at an alarming rate in Canada. There have been nearly 31,000 Canadians who have lost their lives to overdose deaths since January 2016. The Public Health Agency of Canada reported last month that there were 1,833 overdose deaths already in the country between January and March 2022.
It is curious, however, that the drug policies introduced by the Trudeau government, costing billions of dollars, supposedly as an attempt to curb this problem, have only served to intensify it since their policies have increased the availability and use of illegal drugs.
Simply put, although drug addiction is a treatable condition, Liberal policies rather than focusing on treatment, are expanding access to drugs. For example, in March 2020 the federal government approved a program to provide addicts in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side with a “Safe Supply” of drugs during the coronavirus pandemic. This resulted in a 26% increase in opioid deaths by the end of 2021.
The number of drug consumption sites across Canada have enormously increased since Trudeau became Prime Minister. These sites allow addicts to freely inject their drugs, purchased from drug traffickers. Although these drug injection sites claim that they provide the addicts with healthcare and social services, this is not the case in practice, because it is not in the interests of the sites to do so, since their funding is dependent on the number of addicts served by the site.
The drugs purchased from the drug traffickers are frequently tainted with the fatal and powerful drug, fentanyl, which is the major driver of the present crisis.
Proposal by Minister of Addictions and Mental Health, Carolyn Bennett
On September 28, 2022, Minister of Addictions and Mental Health, Carolyn Bennett, announced yet another faulty drug policy, supposedly to stop drug addicts from purchasing illicit drugs from drug traffickers. This policy, called, “Safe Supply”, allows for the government to provide free, non-prescription drugs for the addicts to take home for unsupervised consumption.
The drugs to be provided in this programme include pharmaceutical opioids, heroin, crystal methamphetamine, cocaine, as well as other dangerous substances. This decision by the government to provide free drugs to addicts is not based on evidence, but appears to be a matter of political expediency and ideology.
Problems with Safe Supply Policy
The Trudeau government has funded several Safe Supply pilot projects across Canada but there is no evidence to date that they are successful.
According to evidence provided to the Alberta Select Special Committee by Michael Schellenberger, U.S. author of the book, San Fransicko, the practice of Safe Supply is a “bizarre medical experiment helping homeless drug addicts use drugs, which is a loaded gun to a suicidal person”. This is apparent since the pilot projects indicate that the addicts using the free government drugs still continue to purchase and consume drugs from the street traffickers because fentanyl continues to be found in their urine. In addition, the government supply of free drugs, in some cases, is diverted by some of the addicts for sale, or shared with others. Further, this policy provides no exit strategy for the addict to stop his addiction, but only increases it. It also creates the perception that there is no harm in using drugs. Tragically, this policy increases addiction in the population since the availability of drugs increases consumption.
The Safe Supply policy indicates a severe lack of understanding of how an addiction controls a person. Providing drugs freely to addicts does not help them, as the main driving force for their addiction is poverty, mental and physical illness, which cause despair and hopelessness. They lose their human dignity, become malnourished, develop a pervasive lack of self-esteem, and become homeless as a result of their continued drug use.
Abuse of Taxpayers’ Money
Spending tax dollars to provide free drugs to addicts is madness because it is no help to the addict. It is an impractical and ineffective policy, which is particularly disturbing during this time of uncontrolled inflation. All Canadians are being punished by inflation, but it is particularly harmful to low-income families who cannot provide adequate food for their tables (as indicated by the tremendous demand currently being made on food banks) and who are hampered by the high cost of gas, etc.
What Can be Done?
Please write to Prime Minister Trudeau, Addictions and Mental Health Minister, Carolyn Bennett, and your own MP (regardless of political party) requesting to put a halt to this waste of taxpayers’ dollars on a program that is without merit and also harmful.
Their addresses are as follows:
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
https://pm.gc.ca/en/connect/contact
Minister of Addictions and Mental Health, Carolyn Bennett
Addresses for Current Members of Parliament:
https://www.ourcommons.ca/Members/en/search
For the Family
REAL Women of Canada