Some ideas, despite overwhelming evidence of their failure, stubbornly refuse to die in the political arena. The recent plea from six former Toronto mayors to Premier Doug Ford – urging him to reverse course on closing drug consumption sites – exemplifies this frustrating reality. Ford, however, has remained resolute, prioritizing treatment over what he sees as the dangers of enabling addiction.
The Premier’s stance isn’t born of indifference, but of a deep concern for community safety. He vividly described the consequences of these sites, citing discarded needles and a heightened sense of danger for families and children. “I want to help these people,” he stated, “but I’m not going to sit back as you put these injection sites in the middle of communities.”
The catalyst for Ford’s decision was a tragic event: the July 2023 shooting death of Karolina Huebner-Makurat, a mother of two, caught in the crossfire of a drug-related shootout near a safe injection site. The violence wasn’t a random occurrence; it stemmed from a turf war between drug dealers operating directly outside the South Riverdale Community Health Centre.
The aftermath of the shooting revealed a disturbing connection. A worker at the site was convicted of aiding one of the drug dealers involved, a man she was romantically involved with, in his escape. This case, while extreme, illuminated a troubling pattern: these sites, in practice, often facilitated rather than hindered the drug trade.
The initial promise of these sites – a pathway to recovery – remained largely unfulfilled. Instead, they became platforms for activists advocating for the complete liberalization of drug laws. The SRCHC’s website, even after the shooting, openly espoused a philosophy of “no judgment, no expectations and no desire for people to stop using drugs.”
This “harm reduction” approach, some argue, is less about healing and more about perpetuating addiction. The former mayors, influenced by this ideology, claimed the sites saved lives and prevented overdoses. Yet, a closer examination of the data paints a drastically different picture.
In 2016, before the widespread implementation of safe injection sites in Ontario, the province recorded 868 opioid deaths, 186 of them in Toronto. By 2019, those numbers had surged to 1,565 provincewide and 301 in Toronto – an 80% and 62% increase, respectively. The introduction of these sites coincided with a dramatic rise in opioid-related fatalities.
British Columbia, a province with a longer history of safe injection sites, offers a similarly sobering trend. Opioid overdose deaths more than tripled between 2015 and 2025, climbing from 528 to 1,833. In 2023, B.C. recorded 2,590 deaths, nearly matching Ontario’s 2,643 despite having a population three times smaller.
However, a contrasting narrative is emerging from Alberta. By prioritizing addiction recovery and closing injection sites, the province is demonstrating a potential path toward positive change. A recent study, published in the journal Addiction, tracked 381 users in Red Deer after a site closure.
The results were encouraging. The study revealed a 6.2% increase in individuals seeking rehabilitation services, and crucially, no corresponding rise in deaths, emergency department visits, or ambulance calls. This suggests that shifting focus from harm reduction to recovery is not only feasible but potentially life-saving.
Premier Ford now faces a clear choice: to heed the warnings of data and embrace treatment, or to succumb to the persistent, yet demonstrably flawed, arguments of those clinging to a failed ideology. His current course, grounded in facts and a commitment to community safety, appears to be the only path forward.
