About

ADDICTION: as defined by Vancouver Coastal Health is “a chronic, relapsing illness. It is a compulsive physiological and psychological need for a habit-forming substance.”

Currently the DTES houses just over half of all drug users in the Metro Vancouver region making addiction a visible and concentrated issue in the city. According to Statistics Canada, the city of Vancouver has the highest police reported drug offenses of any major city in Canada. Since 2000, it has been estimated that over $1.4 billion dollars has been spent on the array of services in the DTES, with over $700 million of that being used for health and social services including those to address addiction. After this substantial investment, addiction, among other social problems, remain in Vancouver.

We believe substance abuse and drug addiction remains one of the largest social issues facing this city; and as such must be approached with an open mind and a willingness to identify and address its core issues, as well as its residual issues- homelessness, poverty, and mental illness. The issue of addiction is affected by and interrelated to a number of social factors representing a sensitive dependence on not only the addiction, but its residual and related factors. Substance abuse and addiction damages individuals and communities, and it requires thoughtful debate on solutions.

The colleagues who are a part of this blog will be specifically thinking about, discussing, and proposing novel solutions for this prevalent social issue. Our group will be approaching those already at work on dealing with addiction to gain insight and evaluate what is working and what has not. We hope to take from this some aspects that will help us achieve our objectives and propose meaningful solutions.

If you have suggestions, comments, or insight on substance abuse or our proposed ideas on this blog, we want to hear from you. Please contact any one of us at the contacts below:

Sunny : hsc1@sfu.ca

Nelson : nelson.lian@gmail.com

Matt : mba52@sfu.ca

Ben : bwiles@sfu.ca