Mr. Speaker, I am tabling a petition on the opioid crisis. The petitioners are from Port Alberni, Qualicum and Parksville. They note that more lives have been lost, over 15,000, to a tainted drug supply and that this could have been prevented. They say there have been more lives lost to the opioid crisis than to COVID-19, SARS and H1N1. They are simply asking the government to show that it understands the seriousness of the crisis by declaring it a public health emergency, which needs to happen, under the Emergencies Act, for the government to develop a plan to save lives.
The petitioners are asking the government to reform current drug policy and to create, with urgency and immediacy, a system to provide safe, unadulterated access to substances so that people who use substances, experimentally, recreationally or chronically, are not at imminent risk of overdose because of a contaminated source.