The BC Conservatives have called on David Eby to take action following revelations that a significant amount of "safe supply" drugs doled out since 2022 have not been consumed by their intended recipients.
Surrey South MLA and Solicitor General and Public Safety Critic Elenore Sturko asked the premier to fire Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry, and launch a public inquiry.
A leaked Ministry of Health audit presentation showed that many drugs were instead being trafficked not just across British Columbia, but throughout Canada and internationally as well.
According to the document, obtained by the BC Conservative caucus, pharmacists and doctors prescribed 22,418,000 doses of opioids to around 5,000 patients in the province. That's an average of 4,483 per person.
Hydromorphone accounted for 19%, while fentanyl patches, oxycodone, dextroamphetamine sulfate, and morphone sulfate came in at 13%, 7%, 2%, and 1%, respectively.
A "significant portion" of the drugs in question were "not being consumed by their intended recipients." Instead, "prescribed alternatives are trafficked provincially, nationally and internationally."
Also included in the slides were allegations that dozens of pharmacies were offering incentives to patients to get their fix there and exploiting a PharmaCare loophole to bill up to $11,000 per patient per year, and that a number of community housing employees were promoting certain dispensaries to their tenants.
In a statement to the Vancouver Sun, Health Minister Josie Osborne confirmed that the ministry was aware of the allegations.
"There's absolutely no denial of it," she said. "There's no diminishing of it, and there should be no acceptance of it. That's why we’re taking the actions that we are."
Upon learning of the situation, the BC Conservatives released a statement demanding the government act.
"British Columbia was singled out as a source of illegal opioid trafficking by the American President," Sturko said. "Canada now has a 30-day reprieve from US tariffs to address border security and drug trafficking. David Eby must immediately stop his taxpayer-funded drug trafficking that is fuelling fentanyl use, killing people, and enriching organised crime."
She went on to argue that "there is now no doubt that the NDP Government is responsible for fuelling addiction, deaths, enriching organised crime, and facilitating international drug trafficking."
Both Sturko and BC Conservative leader John Rustad took aim at Henry, with the latter noting that, "while opposition members were raising concerns about diverted 'safe supply,' Bonnie Henry was calling for its expansion, and for drugs like fentanyl, crack cocaine, and meth to be legalised and sold in retail stores."
