Recreational Drugs
Crime costs Canadians more than $43 billion a year, says a landmark report by the Department of Justice. Researchers totaled expenses from police overtime to victims’ lost wages, funeral expenses and trauma.
“Victims bear the direct costs of crime and incur both tangible and intangible costs,” said the report Costs Of Crime In Canada. “The tangible costs estimated in this study include medical costs.”
“The traumatic experience of being a victim can cause severe pain and suffering,” wrote researchers. “This study considers pain and suffering as an intangible cost.”
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Read MoreThe number of accidental drug and alcohol deaths nearly doubled in Ontario during the COVID-19 pandemic, a new study shows.
The study, released on Sept. 14, found that almost 3,000 people died from drug or alcohol toxicity in 2021, compared to nearly 1,600 people in 2018.
The research, conducted by the Ontario Drug Policy Research Network (OPDRN) and Public Health Ontario, says the figure equates to eight deaths every day in 2021.
“This report shows the extent to which substance-related harms have worsened during the pandemic,” said senior author Tara Gomes, a principal investigator of the ODPRN, in a news release on Sept. 15.
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Read MoreShares in Canadian marijuana companies are on fire amid reports the US government is considering loosening federal restrictions on the drug.
The Associated Press reported last week the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has made a recommendation to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) that cannabis be reclassified from a Schedule I to a Schedule III controlled substance.
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Read MoreThe RCMP will consider revising its policy on how long an officer can use recreational cannabis before they return to work from 28 days prior to duty to 24 hours.
The current policy, which has been in place for the last five years when Canada first legalized recreational cannabis, requires Mounties to abstain from consuming pot for four weeks prior to duty.
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Read MoreIn the latest of our 2023 Free Speech in Medicine speaker interviews, I chat with Dr. Julian Somers, a clinical psychologist and researcher who trained with Dr. Bruce Alexander of Rat Park fame. (If you don’t know about Rat Park, you’ll want to take a minute to read about it).
If we really care about people who are addicted, truly see them as having potential, and really want to help them, then what should we do? Certainly more than giving them drugs and needles, and then patting ourselves on the back for our altruism.
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Read MoreA twenty-year-old Ukrainian refugee expressed shock and fear upon witnessing the homeless crisis in Vancouver, Canada. Andrian Makhnachov arrived in Saskatchewan in May 2022 as a refugee escaping his home country’s war with Russia.
The influencer’s Tiktok account has 352,000 followers, where he’s been highlighting his Canadian experiences such as grocery shopping, trying out Canadian snacks, and exploring cities.
After posting a video on August 15 claiming there are no homeless people in Vancouver, responses quickly came in, urging Makhnachov to check out East Hastings Street.
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Read MoreThe UCP government will create a new Gang Suppression Unit and a Firearms Investigative Unit under ALERT (Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams) to combat organized crime in Alberta.
“Everyone has a right to walk through city streets or take public transit without fearing for their safety,” said Mike Ellis, Deputy Premier and Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Services.
“Alberta’s government has no higher priority than protecting Albertans and keeping our communities safe.”
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Read MoreA synthetic opioid called nitazene, which is several times more potent than fentanyl, is contributing to rising cases of drug overdoses in the United States, according to a new study.
“Synthetic opioids, such as the fentanyl analog and nitazene drug class, are among the fastest growing types of opioids being detected in patients in the emergency department (ED) with illicit opioid overdose (OD),” the Aug. 29 study published on JAMA Network said. Analog drugs are similar in chemical structure to a controlled drug. Fentanyl is legal in the United States, while fentanyl analogs are the illicit version. Nitazenes, developed in the 50s, were never approved for the market.
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Read MoreDrug deaths rose by a third in 2021, Statistics Canada said yesterday. The increase in fatalities due to “accidental poisonings” followed parliamentary proposals to decriminalize heroin nationwide.
“An accidental poisoning resulting in death occurs when a person is exposed to a noxious substance such as drugs, alcohol, carbon monoxide or pesticides,” said a StatsCan report Deaths 2021. “Unintentional deaths caused by accidental poisonings accounted for 7,006 deaths in 2021, an increase of 31.9 percent compared with 2020.”
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