British Columbia breaks new overdose records one month after decriminalizing all drugs
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Overdoses continue to skyrocket in B.C. seven years after the province declared the drug epidemic a public health emergency.
(LifeSiteNews) — Seven years after the province of British Columbia declared the drug epidemic a public health emergency, and just one month after the decriminalization of all drugs, overdoses continue to skyrocket.
According to the Canadian Press, B.C. tragically set three new overdose records this March, just the second month after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s federal government allowed the province to decriminalize all drugs starting February 1, 2023, in an effort to combat the crisis.
In March, B.C. saw the most overdose calls ever recorded in one day (205), the highest 30-day overdose call average (119.9), and the most days in a row where paramedics were called to 100 or more such calls (19).
Declaring the uptick in overdoses a public health emergency on April 14, 2016, recent statistics show that annual deaths have nearly quintupled since the government began ramping up its intervention.
The 2016 emergency was invoked after statistics showed that 474 British Columbians had died from drug overdoses in 2015. In 2022, that number had increased nearly 5-fold, resting at just under 2,300 lives lost.
While the current approach by B.C. and many other liberal governments is to increase the so-called “safe supply” of drugs, to erect “supervised consumption sites” where those addicted can legally use drugs in the presence of medical personnel, or to outright decriminalize the possession of drugs, statistics indicate that this strategy has led to the problem getting worse, not better.
For example, the American state of Oregon — separated from B.C. by Washington state — decriminalized all drugs in late 2020.
In 2021, the first full year the policy was in effect, Oregon saw a whopping 52 percent increase in opioid-related deaths, jumping from 472 before decriminalization to 745 after decriminalization.