At a special Drug Strategy Network of Ontario (DSNO) meeting on April 20, 2022, members endorsed four policy solutions to reduce drug poisoning deaths and injuries in Ontario. Implementing these policies will significantly reduce the harms, including death, experienced by people who consume unregulated drugs. They will also improve community safety by reducing drug-related crime and drug poisoning rates, while simultaneously decreasing community costs incurred by first responders, police and courts responding to the current drug poisoning crisis.

View the four policy solutions, show your support, and view related media coverage.

Note: The Municipal Drug Strategy Coordinator's Network of Ontario (MDSCNO) recently changed its name to Drug Strategy Network of Ontario (DSNO).

Legalization and regulation are seen as best way to reduce harm.

By Paige Desmond, Record Reporter

Fri., Feb. 11, 2022
https://www.therecord.com/news...egalizing-drugs.html

Today members of the Municipal Drug Strategy Coordinator's Network of Ontario co-authored a letter to the Honourable Provincial Minister of Health Christine Elliot.

To quote from the letter:

"On behalf of the Municipal Drug Strategy Coordinators Network of Ontario (MDSCNO), we urge the Province of Ontario to implement Consumption and Treatment Services (CTS) throughout the province to save lives and improve the health, safety and well-being of people who use drugs in Ontario. Capping the number of CTS in the province creates regional disparities that do not align with communities’ needs. We, therefore, request that CTS be made available in every municipality that requests one. Opening CTS throughout the province will have a significant impact in averting the escalating number of preventable drug overdose deaths in Ontario."

Today, the Municipal Drug Strategy Coordinator's Network of Ontario sent a letter to the Honourable Federal Minister of Health Patty Hajdu.

To quote from the letter:

"We would like to commend your government for addressing the drug poisoning crisis by funding and facilitating access to safer supply initiatives, and other health interventions. As you know, safer supply initiatives provide pharmaceutical-grade drugs, such as hydromorphone or diacetylmorphine, to people who use substances within a health care context. However, additional safer supply initiatives are needed in Ontario and across Canada. Therefore, on behalf of the Municipal Drug Strategy Coordinators Network of Ontario (MDSCNO), we urge the Government of Canada to immediately increase funding to safer supply initiatives to save lives, and improve the health, safety and well-being of people who use drugs in our province."