Health committee  The challenge would be that CIHI doesn't have timely data, and emergency department data is not universal across the country, but it's a start.

Health committee  Yes.

Health committee  We can look at this in terms of other things we've done. We can look at how we've educated children around alcohol use. From studies we've done in B.C., alcohol use is actually decreasing in teenagers. Around cigarette use, smoking is just not done anymore in that age group. We

Health committee  You'll notice there was a peak in the 1990s, and that was when crack came into B.C. We've been looking at that for some time, and that peak was mainly confined to the Downtown Eastside. We were seeing a lot of people dying. The response was quite different. We have a partnership

Health committee  A variety of factors have led to increased use. We've seen issues related to economic conditions in certain parts of the province. I think our understanding that it was no longer confined to, or just a problem in, one part of the province was one of the reasons we declared an eme

Health committee  Because we have been collecting data on people who are surviving overdoses, the picture that we're seeing of those who have survived overdoses is different, at least in some parts of the province. As well, we're seeing geographic differences. In some parts of the province, it's m

Health committee  Absolutely. That's something we've been advocating for some time. We think harm reduction is one of the important pillars in this response, and it should be in our correctional facilities as well.

Health committee  I think there is some very rigorous research that was done around InSite. Dr. Kerr is one of the lead researchers in that. Those are independent research grants that he received. As I mentioned, there are many different models that we are looking at around safe consumption that

Health committee  Absolutely, and one of our partners, in our response, is our correctional services, the provincial and federal correctional services. We've started with naloxone, and making it available in our provincial corrections facilities. Treatment availability is being worked on. These ar

Health committee  I think communities absolutely have to have an opinion, but it needs to be an informed opinion, and informed on the evidence. There is a lot of evidence about InSite and its effectiveness, not just at saving people's lives but also its impact on crime, the impact on the community

Health committee  —about the effectiveness of these services and how they benefit communities.

Health committee  We don't have data on that, though I can say that the crisis in B.C. has evolved, and it's slightly different from what they're seeing in Ontario right now. It's generally not prescription opioids that we're seeing as the issue; it's illicit opioids that people are buying on the

Health committee  The short answer is “kind of.” There are ticket tests that we've done a pilot of at InSite. They're like those pregnancy tests—those little bars—but they can only detect fentanyl, not some of the other illicit opioids that we're seeing out there, and we don't know how well they w

Health committee  We can do that.

Health committee  I believe so, and it's the opinion of the chief of police. I will say that we have had a lot of positive response from the policing services in B.C., including the RCMP E Division. Through the minister, Health Canada has expressed interest in working with us on trying to overco