When we declared the emergency—it was my predecessor who did that in 2016—it was really to raise awareness about this issue that was changing, and changing rapidly, and leading to people dying at an unprecedented level. It allowed us to pull together information. It allowed us to start working on harm reduction. If we think about it, at the time, naloxone was a medication that was only available under prescription so we have come a long way. We know that the naloxone program, the take-home naloxone program that started out here in British Columbia as a harm reduction measure, has saved thousands of lives.
We were making some progress in putting together more coordination, understanding that pathway to treatment for people with a substance use disorder, and raising awareness about the toxicity and the changing nature of the street drugs. When we hit the pandemic, sadly, a lot of the supports that we had put in place that were making a difference in 2019.... When we had the concerns about transmission of the virus, things got dramatically worse, but also during that period of time, the global drug trade changed dramatically.
The importation of small amounts of synthetic opioids really took over what we were seeing on the street, and that has remained at a very high level. We have also made some progress, though the levels are still very high—too high. We have more awareness now. We have systems in place. We have programs like Hope to Health.
We are now working, finally, I believe, in our health care system at trying to get more cross-provincial support for people who have to enter into the health care system, because we know the stigma and shame that people who use drugs experience in our health care system.
We have these things, but we have to put them all together. We have to work in a coordinated way.