The Conservatives have vowed to ‘defund federal drug dens.’ Here’s what they mean.

published on April 16, 2025 by Andrew Weichel in CTV News

Plans announced by Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to shutter what he called “drug dens” would almost certainly increase Canada’s death toll from preventable overdoses, according to a researcher who helped evaluate North America’s first supervised consumption site.

During a recent campaign stop in B.C., Poilievre vowed to defund all manner of harm-reduction programs – calling them “harm-production programs” – but the party’s platform takes particular aim at temporary overdose prevention sites (OPS).

“Make no mistake, we will be shutting down drug dens,” Poilievre told a crowd in New Westminster on April 6. “These drug consumption sites do not work.”

The sites are operated legally under a blanket Health Canada exemption to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act that allows provinces and territories to open them, at the discretion of their own health ministries, in communities where they believe they’re needed…