St. Albans has become a bulwark against the rising tide of crisis in a neighbourhood overrun with addiction and homelessness, even supplying naloxone to paramedics when official supplies run low
Since the congregation took naloxone training in March, there’s been seven outside St. Albans. But that number is quite modest. At the drop-in centre beneath the church, where some of Ottawa’s most afflicted seek daytime refuge once the overnight shelters close, they’re doing at least one [naloxone application] a day.
Sure, but people quit addictions all the time. Smoking is on a massive decline, drinking too. Somehow the drug that can kill you in an instant is so popular that churches are handing out kits to save them. Insanity.
No one. Just tired of enabling the scourge of our society and disproportionately investing in people who elect to be a drain on us all. Destroying our downtowns and making everyone unsafe.
Ah yes and everyone who has stolen food is just evil and should be jailed because they didn't want to starve? Material conditions can substantial alter people's decision making. If youre stuck in the cycle of poverty knowing very well you aren't making it out, why not do hard drugs? You're never making it anywhere anyway.
Would you have said it was every individual Chinese person fault that they had an opium epidemic and not the British and Chinese administration for allowing the production and trade of opium to be so prevalent? Yes people have agency but if you trap someone in a box and put some heroin in it they'll do it eventually
It's not so crazy when you realize that people are going through tremendous amounts of pain and suffering every day. When you've tried everything available to you and nothing improves, what's the next logical step for getting rid of that pain? A life like that isn't worth living, so realistically, what are you giving up on by turning to drugs?