Editor:
Contrary to the claims of Ms. Smith in her letter last week (“The myth of safer supply,” March 14), people prescribed at least one day’s supply of opioids through the province’s risk mitigation guidelines were 61 per cent less likely to die in the week following that day’s consumption of medicine according to the BC Centre for Disease Control. http://www.bccdc.ca/about/news-stories/stories/2024/prescribing-opioid-risk-mitigation-guidance.
That toxic drug deaths remain the leading cause of death in the province is not in any way related to “widespread” safer supply prescribing –– barely five per cent (approximately 5,000 out of 120,000) of those individuals in B.C. who could qualify for a diagnosis of Opioid Use Disorder accessed the safer supply program (according to the BCCDC).
If the safer supply program had reached more people, the evidence shows more lives could have been saved.
As far as the “well-documented” diversion of safer supply medications goes, the RCMP have stated that there is “no evidence to support a widespread diversion of Safer Supply drugs in the illicit market in BC or Canada.”: https://vancouver.citynews.ca/2024/03/11/bc-safer-supply-drug-diversion-rcmp/.
Diversion has always been a factor in the illicit drug trade; even 20 years ago people who use drugs surveyed in the Downtown East Side of Vancouver (as well as on the Sunshine Coast) often preferred to inject Dilaudid over heroin, because it was a known quantity and quality, which made it easier to avoid overdosing –– a significant risk for many decades before the current health crisis in our province was declared.
Safe supply is a life saving intervention. Dead people can’t recover.
Brian Mackenzie
i2i Peer Support, Gibsons
