Transcript
Speaker: I'm Jane Williams. This is the Red Eye Podcast. You can hear our live broadcast on Saturday mornings from 10 till noon at 100.5 FM in the Lower Mainland.
Speaker: On the podcast today, Kelsey Speed talks with us about the recriminalization of public drug use and possession from a public health perspective.
Speaker: BC is in the midst of an ongoing public health emergency, declared in 2016 in response to significant levels of overdoses and drug poisonings.
Speaker: In response, BC implemented decriminalization in 2023, removing criminal sanctions for possessions of up to 2.5 grams of cocaine, opioids, methamphetamine, and MDMA.
Speaker: Approximately 15 months later, BC amended their decriminalization framework, effectively recriminalizing public drug consumption and possession in public spaces across BC.
Speaker: A commentary just published in the Canadian Journal of Public Health assesses this amendment through a public health lens. Kelsey Speed is one of the co-authors of this commentary.
Speaker: She's a research assistant with the BC Centre on Substance Use and PhD student at the University of British Columbia. Hello, Kelsey. Hi, thank you for having me. I'm really happy you could join us today.
Speaker: Let's talk first of all about the decriminalization framework that was brought in in 2023. What was the stated goal of decriminalizing drug possession?
Speaker: The goal that was stated at the time was to achieve a balance between public safety and public health. They didn't really define either term, but that was the stated goal.
Speaker: And was it also to make sure that people don't enter the criminal law system unnecessarily? That is definitely a positive outcome, or one of the positive goals of decriminalization is to reduce the involvement of people with the criminal legal system.
Speaker: But the way that the decriminalization framework rolled out in BC... They kept the role of police officers in the lives of people who use drugs by having them use cards that referred people who use drugs to health and social services.
Speaker: And so while they may have had the goal of reducing criminal sanctions, they didn't necessarily have the goal of reducing involvement with the criminal legal system. And did the decriminalization framework do anything to reduce health and social inequities? Because I think that was sort of part of the stated goal.
Speaker: In theory, it definitely is a tool that can be used to reduce health and social inequities. Whether that actually happened in BC is unclear. We haven't really seen much evidence about what the outcomes have been.
Speaker: And it's also important to note that because the decriminalization framework was only related to possession and didn't have any impacts on the production or sale of drugs, it didn't have an impact on the quality of the drugs that people can access. And so it didn't have the goal of reducing overdose deaths.
Speaker: However, on the other side, it is a way to increase access to health services, theoretically, by reducing the risk of criminalization. Hopefully that could reduce stigma and discrimination that people experience, which is a known barrier to healthcare access.
Speaker: The framework was intended to be a three-year pilot, but it was amended in May last year in a way that essentially recriminalized personal drug possession.
Speaker: What happened? So the claimed reason that they rolled back the decriminalization framework was in response to widespread use of controlled substances in public spaces.
Speaker: However, if you look at the evidence, the widespread use of controlled substances in public spaces is in question. um We're not sure whether that is true or not because we don't really have the evidence.
Speaker: And on top of that, if it is true, it's unclear whether that is a result of decriminalization itself or to be worsening social supports and systems that are there. So that the increase in homelessness, the increase in poverty, all of those things would also have a big impact on drug use in public spaces because if people don't have their own homes, they will be using in public spaces.
Speaker: In addition, the public health guidance for how to respond or how to prevent fatal overdoses is to use in spaces where other people are there who can respond in a timely manner if you do experience an overdose or other medical emergency.
Speaker: And so some people use in public spaces as a harm reduction measure or a safety strategy to reduce the risk of dying of an overdose because no one is there to provide naloxone or other medical attention.
Speaker: Well, I was going to ask you what the impact of banning public drug consumption is. And I guess it just, if people can't use in a space where there are other people, it just pushes them into other locations. Yeah.
Speaker: Yes, exactly. It pushes people into more isolated spaces where there's less access to services, where there's less access to people who can respond if something happens, where people are more likely to be exposed to violence, and where people are really severed from their support systems and networks.
Speaker: When you say networks, you mean the group of people that are friends, are part of the community, are people who support each other, that all gets kind of scattered if people are pushed out of public spaces?
Speaker: Yeah, and this is something that we saw during COVID too, was that when people weren't able to be together in groups, it was harder to find people because they were spread out and hidden more. And so even for service providers who were looking for their clients or looking for people who they were trying to provide services to or to help in whatever way, they were harder to find.
Speaker: And so that that is a big factor and a big concern that we have with the recriminalization framework. Now, we started the beginning by saying that the goal of decriminalization was to achieve a balance between public health and public safety.
Speaker: Who is the public in that phrase, public safety? That is a great question, and it really depends on who you're talking to. One of the concerns that we have is that the public safety definition that is used as part of the claim decriminalize reverse decriminalization or restrict decriminalization was defined by police and law enforcement bodies. And so from what we can see, this excludes the population of people who use drugs from this concept of public safety, because recriminalization is going to increase the harms and decrease safety for this part of the public.
Speaker: So they're not considered to be part of the public in this definition then? No, they would not be included in this definition because the balance between public safety and public health that it appears that is being used at this point, really at the expense of people who use drugs because their safety is not going to be increased by these measures.
Speaker: You mentioned that there's been an increase in homelessness. And I guess what that translates into is that people who use unregulated drugs don't have a private space to consume drugs because they don't have any private spaces in their lives.
Speaker: Yes, and so that is a definitely a part of the population of people who use drugs who will be more at risk of the harms associated with these policies because they are going to be more visible to police in general and they don't have the option of private spaces to use their drugs.
Speaker: And in addition, in Vancouver specifically, as well as across the province, Supervised consumption services, which are designated to places where people can use their drugs, are not always accessible to people. In other parts of the province, they don't have any that are close by.
Speaker: in Vancouver, some of them are closing down. We already don't have enough. And so between both of those issues, so homelessness and the lack of services and the closure of services, there are really are no other options for people who are experiencing homelessness or unstable housing for where they can use these drugs without risking criminal sanctions.
Speaker: Police budgets have increased substantially under decriminalization. ah I imagine we're likely to see that trend continue now that that more enforcement has called for.
Speaker: That is what we assume. But again, we aren't really sure because the police haven't shared that information. However, in the time since recriminalization has been implemented, we have seen the police budgets increase. There was the announcement about the increase in money going towards policing in the downtown Eastside neighborhood, which is a neighborhood, as you know, that has concentrated drug use.
Speaker: Is there a correlation that's been found between police funding and crime rates? I'm not an expert in that, so I don't want to say too much, but I will say that there is evidence that showed inconsistencies between funding for policing activities and crime rates. And so I would say the evidence isn't there that this is an effective way to reduce crime.
Speaker: So if you look at the emergency that we're in through a public health lens, what needs to happen in BC to end this prolonged public health emergency?
Speaker: There are a lot of different steps that would be very important for ending the public health emergency. I think the first would be to prioritize compassion and human rights, as well as focusing on evidence-based interventions that and evidence-based ways to use the resources as opposed to policing and law enforcement.
Speaker: I think the main message that your listeners can take away from this is that we need non-carceral approaches to drug use, which means nothing that is related to criminalization or criminal sanctions, administrative sanctions.
Speaker: Other aspects of carceral approaches that have been negatively impacting people who use drugs include housing applications that require you to be abstinent. There are jobs that do drug checking and criminal record checking. And so there is evidence that these carceral approaches to drug use are directly harming people who use drugs. And so I think the step forward is to have alternative approaches to drug use.
Speaker: And i would also say that real access to regulated alternatives to the unregulated drug supply are really, really important.
Speaker: So this is through this whole process of decriminalization and then recriminalization, the conversation on safe supply, which you were just referring to, it has it moved forward at all?
Speaker: I would like to just say that I'm not an expert in safe supply, but what I can talk to is the fact that I've heard from multiple people who use drugs who have access to safe supply or not access safer supply is that it's not designed in a way that really works for people who use drugs. And so either they don't have their preferred drugs available. And so they're being prescribed a different drug that doesn't work for them in the same way. And then there's also the issue of witnessed consumption that has been in the news lately, which is that they are now requiring people to consume their drugs witnessed by a healthcare professional or a pharmacist.
Speaker: And so that requires people to be in a pharmacy or in a setting where they can be monitored according to the laws multiple times a day. Some people will have to go four times a day and it just makes it very untenable for people to do that and have any other aspects of their lives like working or family or what if they don't live close to a clinic, but if they have to take transit for an hour, they have to do that multiple times a day.
Speaker: So it's just making it that it's not a real or effective solution for people who want regulated alternatives. There's a business of witnessing safe supply. That's a relatively new development.
Speaker: Yes, it was in the news in the last week or so. Well, thank you so much for speaking with me today, Kelsey. Thank you so much for having me. I've been speaking with Kelsey Speed. She's a research assistant with the BC Center on Substance Use and a PhD student at the University of British Columbia.
Speaker: Her research focuses on women who use drugs and the impacts of policing practices on people who use drugs. You've been listening to the Red Eye Podcast, produced by an independent media collective based in Vancouver.
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Speaker: Thanks for listening.
