Health Canada keeps Ottawa drug site open, defying province, police, parents

OTTAWA, Ontario (LifeSiteNews) — Canada’s federal government renewed approvals for a hard drug injection site despite the provincial government pulling support for such sites and against the express advice of experts.

In March of this year, a so-called “safe” hard drug injection site in Ottawa’s Sandy Hill neighbourhood was told its exemption was being renewed again for one year.

The news came just a few days before the Ontario provincial government under Premier Doug Ford announced it would finally end support for all remaining “hard drug” consumption sites, admitting that allowing the legal drug dens was a “failed experiment.” This included the Sandy Hill site.

Canada’s Federal Health Minister Marjorie Michel was grilled by Conservative MPs about why Health Canada was renewing the federal drug law exemption for such sites. Ottawa’s chief of police, Eric Stubb, along with local community associations, had warned the feds about the injection sites.

The problems at the Sandy Hill site led to a nearby childcare facility closing due to serious safety concerns.

Michel, under repeated questioning by Conservative MP Dan Mazier, would not answer him directly as to why the exception had been renewed for the drug site.

Mazier wanted to know why Michel had “ignored law enforcement” in its assertion that such drug sites caused problems in the neighborhood and to the community as a whole.

In an opinion piece in the National Post, Derek Finkle said the “idea” that Health Canada, “in renewing the exemption for the site in Ottawa’s Sandy Hill neighbourhood, was taking its cues from the Ontario government of Doug Ford, who openly detests injection sites,” was “fantastical.”

As for Mazier, he said last month that he would be bringing forth federal legislation that would ban drug injection sites within 500 meters of any school or daycare.

Records show that the Liberal government under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spent approximately $820 million from 2017 to 2022 on its Canadian Drugs and Substances Strategy. However, even the Department of Health admitted in a 2023 report that the Liberals’ drug program only had “minimal” results.

As reported by LifeSiteNews in December, the Canadian Department of Health confirmed that taxpayer dollars were used to fund the purchase of drug paraphernalia such as crack pipes and other items permitted under the Liberal government’s “Safe Supply” program.

In 2024, the Liberal government was forced to end a three-year drug decriminalization experiment in British Columbia that allowed people to have small amounts of cocaine and other hard drugs on hand without charge. However, public complaints about social disorder skyrocketed during the experiment.

As reported by LifeSiteNews, Canada’s Health Department recently admitted that a Trudeau-era trial of allowing hard drug consumption was a disaster and led to a complete breakdown of public order in some locations.

Official figures show that overdoses went up during the decriminalization trial, with 3,313 deaths over 15 months compared with 2,843 in the same time frame before drugs were temporarily legalized.

As reported by LifeSiteNews, British Columbia Premier David Eby was forced to admit that a drug decriminalization trial in his province, which was implemented with the full backing of Canada’s ruling federal Liberal Party, was a failure and “didn’t work.”