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FIRST READING: Feds signal departure from 'harm reduction' approach to overdose crisis

'More and more you see provinces who don’t want safe consumptions sites, they want to act more on treatment,' said health minister

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FIRST READING: Feds signal departure from 'harm reduction' approach to overdose crisis Back to video

Despite a longtime Canadian strategy of addressing record-high overdoses predominantly through “harm reduction,” a Carney government official revealed this week that the population hardest hit by drug overdoses is mostly asking for ways to get clean.

“In almost every single meeting I’ve had this year, leadership has indicated to me that treatment centres are one of their big capital asks,” Indigenous Services Minister Mandy Gull-Masty told a Monday press conference on Parliament Hill.

The press conference was an update on an illegal drug crisis that continues to hit Canada harder than almost any other country on earth. As per figures tracked by the Commonwealth Fund, Canada is second only to the U.S. in its rate of fatal overdoses.

And as Gull-Masty noted on Monday, this has disproportionately impacted Indigenous communities, with more than 10 per cent of all Canadian First Nations having enacted states of emergency related to the drug crisis

“There are presently 67 First Nations that have declared states of emergency in relation to drugs,” she said.

Particularly over the last decade, harm reduction — the notion of making it safer to consume illicit drugs without dissuading their use........

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