Crosstown Clinic patient Michel has used opiates for 30 years. His addiction to heroin, he says, drove him to use “alternative methods to get money, like criminal activity.”

Six years ago, exhausted by the lifestyle he was leading, Michel joined Crosstown as a patient and began accessing prescription injectable heroin.

“It worked from day one,” he says. “There was immediate relief from the daily grind all addicts go through — it felt like freedom.”

Providence Health Authority’s Crosstown Clinic in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside offers a range of treatments for opioid use disorder, including opioid agonist therapy, medical care and wraparound services with social workers and counsellors.

British Columbia first declared a public health emergency due to toxic drugs in 2016. Since then, the drug supply has only increased in potency and unpredictability, with fentanyl, carfentil and benzodiazepines — which can increase the risk of overdose and complicate the reversal of overdoses — showing up more and more frequently. Toxic drugs have killed over 12,700 British Columbians since 2016, making unregulated drug toxicity the leading cause of death in the province for people aged 10 to 59.

While the province has been ramping up harm reduction initiatives, such as distributing naloxone kits and permitting safer supply, it has not been able to keep up with the toxicity of drugs bought on the illicit market, leading to a rise in toxic drug deaths year after year.

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The Tyee
September 12, 2023