Lisa Lapointe retired in February as chief coroner on a wave of frustrated disgruntlement over the NDP cabinet’s refusal to follow her controversial recommendations to advance safe supply of dangerous drugs.
It crystallized last November when her office recommended broadening safe supply by offering drugs to dependent users even without prescriptions. The government issued a news release rejecting the idea even before she finished her news conference. It was either a timing glitch or a remarkably insulting move.
The term of her appointment expired a few months later and she retired.
She popped back up Tuesday standing beside B.C. Green Party Leader Sonia Furstenau to blast B.C. NDP and B.C. Conservative stances and offer full support for the Green policy, which reflects most of the concepts she advanced.
With 13 years as chief coroner, half of them immersed in the toxic drug provincial state of emergency, she carries some clout.
The signals Tuesday were that she intends to use it. She’s going to back the Greens through the campaign in advancing their views on the drug crisis, and criticizing the NDP and Conservative positions.
“If I can support in any way a meaningful response to this crisis I will definitely take advantage of opportunities.”
For all the Conservative and newfound NDP emphasis on the importance of treatment relative to providing safer supply while awaiting treatment, she stressed the “treatment industry” is virtually unregulated, with no standards and no data about effectiveness.
“How are we going to treat our way out of this crisis without having the data to know what works?”
Lapointe also condemned the NDP and Conservative emphasis on involuntary care. Conservatives have stressed it for a year or more. NDP Leader David Eby, who raised the idea early in his term then dropped it, recently committed to expanding that option.
Before the election campaign started he announced plans to legislate broader eligibility for secure care, and more such facilities.
Lapointe said: “There is no evidence that involuntary care for people suffering from substance abuse disorder is effective.”
She said even the expert the NDP relied on in committing to it admitted there is “very little evidence” that it works.
“We need to be very careful before we jump off this involuntary care cliff.”
She questioned how much it will cost in a system that is already grasping for dollars. She also questioned what patients return to when they recover their health but remain homeless.
“Is it just going to be a revolving door?
“It is misleading the public that this will actually be an effective tool.”
Although involuntary care is cited as a way of reducing the menace of unhinged people violently attacking citizens, Lapointe said the criminal justice system already deals with them. And if mental health is the issue, involuntary care is already an option for them.
She was similarly critical of the entire health care system. People can’t get doctors, or mental health support and “there are wait lists for every type of substance abuse treatment.”
“If people can’t access voluntary care … how can we then incarcerate them involuntarily, with no evidence that would be successful? … We are setting ourselves up for disaster.”
Lapointe defended the drug decriminalization pilot project that the NDP commenced in 2023 then backed away from in the face of widespread community concern about rampant public drug use.
“I can tell you, fewer people are dying post decrim. There is a trend down in fatalities … they are showing the lowest death rate since 2020.
“Decriminalization is not a failure.”
Providing safer illicit drugs or alternatives is not promoting drug use.
She was speaking one day after Nanaimo RCMP announced a significant drugs and weapons bust right outside an overdose prevention site.
Conservative Leader John Rustad promised the previous day to shut down B.C.’s 48 supervised drug consumption sites, a key part of the safe supply effort.
In the midst of an election campaign, all hope of depoliticizing the various arguments about the drug crisis is now lost.
Conservatives used it successfully to attack the NDP for months before the campaign started, to the point where Eby started borrowing from their platform.
Lapointe said Tuesday it is “critically important” to let health professionals take the lead.
But — other than her — they’re not the ones doing the talking during the campaign. The politicians are.
