RE: ‘The law needs to be changed’: Nelson group rallies in support of safe drug supply, Nelson Star, Jan. 18.
Kudos to the Nelson residents who stood in minus-10 weather outside Nelson City Hall to show solidarity with criminalized founders of the Drug User Liberation Front and to raise awareness about the poisoned drug crisis. As they correctly state, this is a Nelson issue — and an issue for every locale in the province given the extent of this crisis.
Make no mistake, this is a crisis of policy failure, of criminalization and prohibition. It is a health-care crisis in which so many deaths could have been avoided with government-regulated safe supply. Instead the people who are working to save lives are hauled before court.
The criminalization of drug use, and drug users, has dominated public policy for generations. It is well established by volumes of research that this raises prospects for harm and costs lives. These studies range across a wide spectrum of research, from health professionals to social workers to criminologists.
We are in a toxic drug crisis that has taken over 13,000 lives since 2016. There is no place for the panic shown by politicians over community-based safe supply provision. We need reasoned, caring approaches that recognize the reality of drug use, the failures of criminalization, and the health and safety needs of people who use drugs.
Kudos too to your reporter for bringing such a thoughtful, and detailed, analysis to this life and death issue.
Dr. Jeff Shantz
Department of Criminology, Kwantlen Polytechnic University
Surrey