Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.

• Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account.
• Get exclusive access to the Vancouver Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on.
• Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists.
• Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists.
• Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.

Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada.

• Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account.
• Get exclusive access to the Vancouver Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on.
• Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists.
• Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists.
• Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.

Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.

• Access articles from across Canada with one account.
• Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.
• Enjoy additional articles per month.
• Get email updates from your favourite authors.

Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.

• Access articles from across Canada with one account
• Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments
• Enjoy additional articles per month
• Get email updates from your favourite authors

Sign In or Create an Account

or View more offers

It is inappropriate that B.C.-based NovaRed Mining recently appointed Kristi Noem, the former U.S. secretary of homeland security, to their advisory board. While she was director of homeland security under U.S. President Donald Trump, Noem was responsible for rounding up and deporting thousands of people of colour, a highly polarizing operation that is one of the darkest chapters in U.S. history. Does the Upper Similkameen First Nation want this polarizing and highly controversial person helping to oversee mining operations on their traditional territory? In addition, Noem failed to show basic respect to Canadians as she repeatedly referred to Canada as the 51st state on Jan. 30, 2025 while stepping across the taped border between Derby Line, Vt., and Stansted, Que.

Charles Claus, Terrace

Complex picture behind declining toxic drug deaths

Palmer’s argument that the B.C. government’s move away from harm reduction and decriminalization are responsible for declining numbers of toxic drug deaths fails to account for two key facts.

First, similar reductions have been seen in many jurisdictions across the U.S. and Canada, settings with fundamentally different drug policies, health care systems, and approaches to harm reduction and substance use treatment.

Second, deaths in B.C. began to fall before the policy shifts credited by Palmer, more than a year before changes to the prescribed alternatives program and nearly two years before it ended decriminalization.

The scientific evidence, including research conducted locally, paints a more complex picture and suggests factors such as reduced fentanyl concentrations in the unregulated drug supply and increased uptake of take-home naloxone kits to reverse opioid overdoses, play an important role.

As always, the public should be wary of politically convenient claims about this crisis made without evidence, which can undermine our collective ability to effectively address a public health crisis still claiming the lives of four British Columbians each day.

M-J Milloy, interim director of research, B.C. Centre on Substance Use, and associate professor of medicine, UBC

Lianping Ti, research scientist at B.C. Centre on Substance Use and assistant professor, department of medicine, UBC

Downward trend in overdose deaths began in 2024

Vaughn Palmer attributes the decline in overdose deaths in B.C. to the abandonment of decriminalization and safer supply efforts. Yet the downward trend began in 2024, long before most of these policy changes came into effect. The same decrease has been visible elsewhere in Canada too, as well as in the U.S.

To credit our provincial government’s decision to backtrack on life-saving harm reduction strategies is overly simplistic.

David Taub Bancroft, Vancouver 

While Canadians continue to struggle, should government subsidize World Cup?

Re: When FIFA comes to your city it’s short-term gain, long-term pain

Alexandra Addison’s oped raises questions about whether the benefits of 13 World Cup games in Canada justify their cost.

According to the Parliamentary Budget Office, $1 billion of taxpayers’ money, or more accurately borrowed money, is spent on bringing a few World Cup games to Canada. That is $82 million a World Cup game.

Meanwhile, the number of deaths among B.C.’s homeless has more than tripled during the last 10 years, reflecting the similar growth in our homeless population since 2018. Across Canada, 60,000 Canadians experience homelessness each night. Nearly a quarter of Canadians live with food insecurity, including 2.4 million children.

Perhaps a referendum could ask the question: Should our governments be subsidizing professional sporting events?

John Shepherd, Richmond 

Trade concessions are painful but necessary reality

It’s become clear that Canada will have to make trade concessions in order to make trade deals. This is a painful reality, so let’s target concessions that make life more affordable. Dairy is an obvious choice because we pay too much for milk.

Canadian content is another. Do we really need to pay more to have CanCon shoved down our throats after all these years? Cheaper, good quality, electric cars can help our budgets and the environment.

And why aren’t we refining more of our Alberta crude oil into gasoline in our own country, rather than building more pipelines and importing fuel back from the U.S.? Some sacred cows will need to be sacrificed. It’s time we stopped subsidizing companies with our tax dollars to create jobs.

Glen C Taylor, Coquitlam