Pubdate: Sat, 28 Jan 2017 Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC) Copyright: 2017 Postmedia Network Inc. Contact: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477 Page: A18 GET ADDICTS OFF DRUGS Affordable housing and drug addiction are among the most talked about issues in B.C., especially in the Lower Mainland. The latest survey from Demographia ranked Vancouver the third-least affordable housing market in the world. Companies fear a loss of skilled labour as millennials seek a lower cost of living elsewhere. Parents worry their children will be unable to live in the communities where they were raised. And the latest figures released by the B.C. Ministry of Health and B.C. Coroners Service show 914 lives were lost due to illicit drug overdoses last year, 215 of those in the City of Vancouver. The provincial total is an increase of nearly 80 per cent from a year earlier. So, perhaps it's not surprising mayors of Canada's biggest cities used the opioid crisis in their push to extract $12.6 billion from the federal government over the next decade for affordable housing. They argue federal housing assistance is a critical part of an intervention to keep addicts away from street drugs laced with fentanyl. But conflating affordable housing with drug addiction does a disservice to both problems. The drug death figures included a surprising statistic: 90 per cent of illicit drug overdoses in 2016 occurred inside - 61.3 per cent in private residences and 28.7 per cent in other locations such as trailer homes, hotels, rooming houses and public buildings. Despite the ubiquitous images of first responders reviving a victim in a Downtown Eastside alley, only 9.2 per cent of overdose deaths were outside, on sidewalks or streets or in vehicles, parks, wooded areas and campgrounds. Affordability is the relationship between home prices and median income, and the imbalance is dealt with by increasing housing supply, tweaking mortgage rules, enforcing tax rules, improving job quality and wages, adjusting interest rates and other measures. Affordability has no connection to the opioid crisis. Federal bean counters will be quick to recognize this. Where the big-city mayors should focus their attention is on funding for addiction and mental health services. Part of those services may be supportive social housing, where addicts live in a drug-free environment and receive treatment. For that should be the overriding goal of every level of government and health authorities they fund: to get addicts off drugs. There is no question harm reduction policies have saved lives and play an important role in any solution, but they have a downside - they send the message it's OK to be a drug addict. It is not OK. Governments must do far more to stop the flood of dangerous drugs into our communities, provide adequate funding to help users break their addiction, and educate children and adults alike that being a drug addict is a waste of a life. - --- MAP posted-by: Matt