Paul Willcocks On InSite

OpinionsOfTheWellInformed
CountForColumnistsTooVille


It's good:

The ruling on the future of Vancouver's safe injection site should change the way we talk about drugs and addiction.

It will certainly reveal that those who cling to the status quo - like federal Health Minister Tony Clement - place prejudice ahead of evidence and the law.

Justice Ian Pitfield was ruling on an injunction application aimed at preventing the federal government from closing Insite......


After laying out the arguments of both sides, Mr. Willcocks then goes to the heart of the decision from Judge Pitfield:

Pitfield reviewed the medical evidence supplied by both sides.

And he found that Insite users weren't making a choice to inject drugs. Addiction is a disease.

"However unfortunate, damaging, inexplicable and personal the original choice may have been, the result is an illness called addiction," he found.

"While there is nothing to be said in favour of the injection of controlled substances that leads to addiction, there is much to be said against denying addicts health care services that will ameliorate the effects of their condition," Pitfield found. "Society does that for other substances such as alcohol and tobacco."


And, finally, as is so often the case with Mr. Willcocks's posts on his own site, some his best gloves-off stuff is in the footnote:

Footnote: Clement said the Harper government still doesn't approve, though he did not explain why people should die for its prejudices. The facts, as the court found, support Insite, which is also supported by Premier Gordon Campbell and Health Minister George Abbott and is funded by the province. Vancouver's mayor and police force also back its continued operation.


So, again, the next time you hear federal HEALTH Minister, Mr. Clement, setting us up for one of his diversionary 'alternatives' just remember that we already have one.

That works.

OK?

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Mr. Willcocks also does us the service of pointing us to the link for Judge Pitfield's actual judgment which can be found here (careful: pdf).

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