Canada’s largest public health board is calling on Ottawa to decriminalize all drugs, arguing that saving lives is more important than stigma-laced arguments against the idea. Toronto’s public health board, a mix of city councillors and public appointees, voted 10-0 Monday to endorse the recommendation from Dr. Eileen de Villa, the city’s medical officer of health. The vote came after the release last week of her research-filled report on the subject and argument that people have always used drugs and all those consumed today — including tobacco, alcohol, coffee, pharmaceuticals and illegal street drugs — can be hazardous to health. “The potential harms associated with any of these drugs is worsened when people are pushed into a position where they have to produce, obtain and consume those drugs illegally, so that’s what we’re trying to address,” de Villa said, with a call for a “public health approach” focused on treatment and harm minimization rather police, courts and jail. Councillor Joe Cressy, Toronto council’s point person on drug policy, noted her report triggered only a handful of public responses at the meeting and they were supportive of the shift in focus. The deadly and worsening opioid overdose epidemic has “shifted the landscape,” he said, in support of safe-injection sites and decriminalization because so many people know someone touched by tragedies involving fentanyl, a highly toxic painkiller, and other drugs. Read more: Chief medical officer calls for decriminalization of all drugs for personal use Opinion | The case for decriminalizing drugs Overdose deaths taking ‘huge toll’ on advocates “I don’t believe that drug use is safe, nor does endorsing the position in support of decriminalizing of drugs advocate for drug use,” Cressy said. “I don’t want people to use drugs,” he said, adding criminalization has pushed them into unsafe situations, avoiding treatment and burdening many with criminal convictions with lifelong implications. Councillor Joe Mihevc, the health board chair, got his colleagues to agree to send the recommendation to other health boards and agencies across Canada in hopes some will follow Toronto’s lead and increase pressure on Ottawa to abandon a “punitive approach to drugs.” Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... “Let’s make a national thing of this,” to get people to see drug use and think of helping users with medical or public health resources rather than punishing them with police, Mihevc said. “I don’t think we’re there yet and the only way in which federal laws are going to change is if we provoke that national conversation.”<doc-sep>Canada has become the first wealthy nation in the world to fully legalize marijuana. The Senate approved Bill C-45, also known as the Cannabis Act, on Tuesday. The measure was already approved by the House of Commons, so the Senate’s approval means it’s now set to become law. The measure legalizes marijuana possession, home growing, and sales for adults. The federal government will oversee remaining criminal sanctions (for, say, selling to minors) and the licensing of producers, while provincial governments will manage sales, distribution, and related regulations — as such, provinces will be able to impose tougher rules, such as raising the minimum age. The statute largely follows recommendations made by a federal task force on marijuana legalization. The law will go into effect on October 17, with at least some sales beginning on that date, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said. None of this may seem too shocking in the US, where already nine states have legalized marijuana for recreational use and 29 states have allowed it for medicinal purposes. What sets Canada apart, though, is it’s doing this as a country. Previously, the South American nation of Uruguay was the only one that legally allowed marijuana for recreational purposes. Canada, like the US, is part of international drug treaties that explicitly ban legalizing marijuana. Although activists have been pushing to change these treaties for years, they have failed so far — and that means Canada will be, in effect, in violation of international law in moving to legalize. (The US argues it’s still in accordance with the treaties because federal law still technically prohibits cannabis, even though some states have legalized it.) For Canada’s ruling party, this fulfills a major campaign promise. When Trudeau’s Liberal Party was elected in 2015, one of the main promises he ran on was to legalize marijuana. “We will legalize, regulate, and restrict access to marijuana,” the Liberal Party declared on its campaign website. “Canada’s current system of marijuana prohibition does not work. It does not prevent young people from using marijuana and too many Canadians end up with criminal records for possessing small amounts of the drug.” But the process languished as Trudeau and his allies waited for a federal task force’s recommendations and as the Senate debated several provisions in the bill. In moving forward, the Canadian government is now walking a fine line: It’s hoping to legalize marijuana to clamp down on the black market for cannabis and provide a safe outlet for adults, but it’s risking making pot more accessible to kids and people with drug use disorders. It is taking a bold step against outdated international drug laws, but it could upset countries like Russia, China, and even the US that have historically adopted a stricter view of the treaties. And while Canadian lawmakers may feel marijuana legalization is right for their country, there’s a risk that legal Canadian pot will spill over to the US — perhaps causing tensions with Canada’s neighbor and one of its closest allies. Whether Canada is successful in its legalization attempts will depend on how it strikes a balance between these concerns. And depending on how it pulls this off, it may provide a model to other countries interested in legalization — including the US. The risks and benefits of legalization For Canada, marijuana legalization has been a balancing act from the start. On one hand, marijuana prohibition has a lot of costs. In Canada, tens of thousands of people are arrested for marijuana offenses each year, ripping communities and families apart as people are thrown in jail or prison and gain criminal records. Enforcement of these laws also costs money, while legalizing and taxing marijuana could bring in extra revenue — although typically not that much, based on Colorado’s experience, where marijuana taxes make up less than 1 percent of the general budget. The black market for marijuana fuels violence around the world — not only can it lead to conflicts and violence within Canada, but the money from illegally produced and sold pot often goes back to drug cartels that then use that money to carry out brutal violence, including murders, beheadings, kidnappings, and torture. Legalization shifts marijuana out of the illicit, potentially violent market toward a legal one that can produce legitimate jobs. Legalization carries risks too. It could lead to more use and misuse by making pot cheaper and more available. Mark Kleiman, a drug policy expert at New York University’s Marron Institute, estimates that in the long term a legal marijuana joint will cost no more to make than, say, a tea bag — since both products come from plants that are fairly easy to grow. It would also be available to anyone (of legal age) in retail outlets after legalization — meaning it would no longer require a shady or secretive meeting with a drug dealer. Those are benefits for people who use marijuana without problems, to be sure, but easier access could also pose a risk for people who can’t control their cannabis consumption. Although marijuana isn’t very dangerous compared to some drugs, it does carry some risks: dependence and overuse, accidents, nondeadly overdoses that lead to mental anguish and anxiety, and, in rare cases, psychotic episodes. Still, it’s never been definitively linked to any serious ailments — not deadly overdoses, lung disease, or schizophrenia. And it’s much less likely — around one-tenth so, based on data for fatal car crashes — to cause deadly accidents compared to alcohol, which is legal. Among the risks, drug policy experts emphasize the risk of overuse and addiction. As Jon Caulkins, a drug policy expert at Carnegie Mellon University, has told me, “At some level, we know that spending more than half of your waking hours intoxicated for years and years on end is not increasing the likelihood that you’ll win a Pulitzer Prize or discover the cure for cancer.” A balancing act To this end, Canada is striking a balance unlike that of the US’s legalization experiments so far. So far in the US, the eight states that have legalized pot sales have done so with a model similar to alcohol.<doc-sep>Since then, there has been a sharp decline in drug overdose deaths and in the number of HIV and AIDS cases associated with injecting drugs. The number of young adults who report using cocaine, MDMA or amphetamines in the past year has also decreased, according to the European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction. Critics of decriminalization had feared a surge in levels of drug use among the general population, but it did not materialize.<doc-sep>Moscow says Ottawa is trampling on international law by legalizing recreational use of cannabis. Canada is set to become world’s second nation to fully decriminalize production and consumption of pot. The rebuke comes after Canadian lawmakers approved a law regulating production and circulation of cannabis for recreational purposes. Moscow believes that the law, which is to come into force come autumn, directly violates Ottawa’s international commitments, Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Thursday. Read more The ministry referred to three key treaties dealing with narcotics – the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, the 1971 Convention of Psychotropic Substances and the 1988 UN Convention against illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances – all of which Canada endorsed. The documents as well international bodies tackling illegal drug trade, do not condone using “exceptions” or “flexible interpretation” to turn scheduled substances into entertainment. Moscow sees the change of policy in Canada as a “serious obstacle” on the way to a drug-free society. “We expect, that Canada’s “arbitrariness” will merit a response from its G7 partners, since this group has repeatedly declared its commitment to the rule of law in interstate relations,” the ministry added. Last week, Canada became the second country in the world, after Uruguay, to make limited production and recreational use of marijuana legal. It was initially expected that law would be enacted within 8 to 12 weeks, however, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced the law will not take effect until October 17. The delay is needed so that individual provinces that had opposed the bill have enough time to make adjustments to their local laws, he said. Long queues at Uruguayan pharmacies as recreational cannabis finally legal to sell (VIDEO) https://t.co/8LD4KMmRrqpic.twitter.com/BRLHCfVdAD — RT (@RT_com) July 20, 2017 Several provinces, namely Quebec, Nunavut, and Manitoba, vowed to contest the Cannabis Act in court. They mostly object to allowing the home growing of the plant and want the authority to fully ban the practice rather than limiting the cap from the federally-mandated four to one, which they can do under the new law. Read more The medical use of marijuana has been legal in Canada since the 2000s, but the recreational use of remained criminalized since 1923. The pledge to abolish the long-standing ban was one of the key pre-election promises of Trudeau’s ruling Liberal Party, which received a parliamentary majority in the 2015 general elections. The Canadian government argues that by legalizing pot it will squeeze out of business the street gangs, which have been profiting from a thriving cannabis black market. Canadians will be able to buy weed in shops, which should be licensed by the government, as well as online. Critics of the legislation say that it will fail to eliminate the black market, only causing a surge in demand. It was estimated that the legal recreational marijuana industry can generate up to $4.3 billion in profits in the first year after the law is enacted. If you like this story, share it with a friend!<doc-sep>
Send this page to someone via email TORONTO – The board of health in Canada’s most populous city decided Monday to push the federal government to decriminalize all drugs and is calling on Canadians to turn their recommendation into a national movement. The board made the move after being presented with a report by Dr. Eileen de Villa, the medical officer of health, urging the city to call on the feds to treat drug use as a public health issue, rather than a criminal one. “The only way that federal laws are going to change is if we provoke that national conversation,” said board chair Coun. Joe Mihevc, moments before an amended version of the recommendations was unanimously accepted. “We will be the first to do it, but we can’t be the one and only,” he said. Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "We will be the first to do it, but we can't be the one and only," he said. Story continues below advertisement De Villa said she wasn’t aware of any other boards of health in Canada that had made similar recommendations to the federal government. The board of health will now send a letter to Ottawa, informing the government of its recommendation. The board also recommended de Villa send the report to Ontario-based public health boards, the boards of health in Canada’s 10 largest cities, the Ontario Public Health Association and other similar groups “for their information and endorsement.” READ MORE: Toronto police begin rollout of naloxone kits amid opioid crisis “What we are saying here is drug use has always been with us,” de Villa said. “Humans have always used drugs in one way, shape or form. “The potential harms associated with any of these drugs is worsened when people are pushed into a position where they have to produce, obtain and consume those drugs illegally,” she said. “That’s what we’re trying to address through this particular report and this recommendation.” The move comes as a direct response to an overdose epidemic that has swept the country, starting in British Columbia and moving east. In 2017, there were 303 opioid overdose related deaths in Toronto, which the report says marks a 63 per cent increase compared to the previous year. Story continues below advertisement According to a Health Canada report last month, nearly 4,000 Canadians died from an apparent opioid overdose in 2017. READ MORE: Toronto opens permanent supervised injection site in downtown core But the federal agency said the government is not currently looking at decriminalizing or legalizing all drugs. “We are committed to a compassionate and evidence-based approach to drug policy, which requires a public health approach when considering and addressing drug issues,” said Health Canada spokeswoman Maryse Durette, before the city accepted de Villa’s recommendation. “We are aware that decriminalization, as part of a comprehensive approach to substance use, seems to be working in places like Portugal, but more study would be required as the circumstances are very different in Canada.” LISTEN: A caller who says he’s a former drug addict weighs in on The Exchange with Matt Gurney