FIFA Vancouver website guides tourists on how to consume illegal drugs

VANCOUVER — The official website for Vancouver’s role as a 2026 FIFA World Cup host city includes a step-by-step guide for visitors on how to consume illegal and unregulated drugs..The “Need to Know” safety page on vancouverfwc26.ca, under a section on safer substance use and laws, opens by stating that the province is experiencing a toxic drug public health emergency involving fentanyl and other contaminants. The helpful ‘how-to guide’ warns that Vancouver’s unregulated drug supply “is unpredictable and may be more dangerous than what visitors are used to in other countries or regions.” As such, the site advises drug users to take their illicit substances to a drug testing site, and then to “start low, go slow.”It also advises users to avoid combining drugs—only noting alcohol specifically—along with encouraging users to get high in the presence of others..Confoundingly, the same page delivers straightforward legal and regulatory information for alcohol and cannabis. Overdose deaths from alcohol and cannabis remain relatively rare compared with those driven by the unregulated toxic supply. The page does not apply equivalent “here are the rules — these substances are illegal and strongly discouraged” regulatory language to hard drugs such as fentanyl, heroin, crystal methamphetamine or crack cocaine — the substances most closely tied to the city’s ongoing overdose crisis.The province ended its decriminalization experiment involving those drugs earlier this year, although enforcement remains sparse and inconsistent — especially in areas like Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.Its safe supply program remains full-steam ahead, however. In fact, “you do not need identification or Canadian health coverage to access harm reduction or overdose prevention services in British Columbia,” the guide states.The BC Coroners Service recorded 1,826 unregulated drug toxicity deaths in 2025, down from 2,315 the year before. Deaths have continued to fall in 2026, with 119 in April — a 32% drop from April 2025 — though the daily toll remains significant.

FIFA Vancouver website guides tourists on how to consume illegal drugs

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