Tag: drug

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Raised in the shadow of Elvis Presley’s death, Lisa Marie Presley endured multiple divorces, tragedy and a drug addiction

Raised in the shadow of Elvis Presley’s death, Lisa Marie Presley endured multiple divorces, tragedy and a drug addiction

Lisa Marie Presley was the only child of just one of the most popular couples in the globe, and also aspect of one particular of the most tragic households.

Numerous would imagine becoming the daughter of “the King of Rock and Roll” came with an abundance of fame and fortune. 

But Presley uncovered herself on a darker timeline, 1 loaded with heartbreak and reduction. 

By means of all of it, she endured, and stored the flame of her father burning shiny.

She was nine a long time previous when Elvis died

Elvis Presley died in August 1977, when he was just 42.

Lisa Marie was being at Graceland at the time and would recall him kissing her goodnight several hours before he would collapse and under no circumstances get well.

When she future saw him the next day, he was lying encounter down in the toilet.

“I just experienced a emotion,” she informed Rolling Stone in 2003. “He was not carrying out effectively. All I know is I had it (a emotion), and it took place.”

“I was obsessed with demise at a extremely early age.”

Elvis and Lisa Marie
Elvis Presley with wife Priscilla and daughter Lisa Marie Presley in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1968.(AP)

Four marriages — 4 splits

In 1988, Presley married musician Danny Keough.

They had two children, actor Riley Keough in 1989, and Benjamin Keough in 1992.

But just months soon after her divorce from Keough in 1994, she married Michael Jackson. 

That marriage finished 18 months later on and was defined by numerous awkward community appearances, which includes an unanticipated kiss from Jackson through the MTV Video Audio Awards and a joint job interview with Diane Sawyer when she defended her husband against allegations he had sexually abused a insignificant.

MJ
Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley, pictured at Jackson’s Neverland Valley Ranch, were married in the Dominican Republic in 1994.(Reuters)

Her other celebrity marriage was even shorter: Nicholas Cage in 2002. 

They filed for divorce immediately after four months of marriage, with their divorce finalised in 2004. 

Nic Cage
Nicolas Cage and Lisa Marie Presley’s relationship ended in 2002 just after 4 months. (Reuters)

She went on to marry guitarist, songs producer and director, Michael Lockwood, in 2006.

They share twin daughters, Harper and Finley Lockwood. 

Her marriage to Lockwood would conclusion in a combative and protracted divorce that began in 2016 and even now was not resolved when she died, nevertheless they have been declared one in 2021.

The fight noticed the girls, now 15, put temporarily in protective custody in 2017. 

Her son died by suicide at 27

Presley’s only son Benjamin died by suicide in 2020 at 27.

She was vocal about her grief, producing in an essay last August that she experienced “been residing in the horrific truth of its unrelenting grips given that my son’s death two years back.”

“I’ve dealt with dying, grief and reduction since the age of nine several years old,” she wrote in an essay shared with Folks journal. 

“I’ve had more than anyone’s fair share of it in my lifetime and by some means, I have made it this much.”

She was a former Scientologist 

In 1992, Presley’s son was born less than tips established by Church of Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard, according to an Connected Pres tale at the time.

According to The New York Situations, Presley and her friend, who is also Scientologist Isaac Hayes, opened the Literacy, Education and learning and Means Application (LEAP) in 1997. 

In 2002, Presley’s do the job on behalf of the Church of Scientology acquired her the organisation’s Humanitarian Award. 

However, Connected Press reported Presley had remaining Scientology due to experiencing developing discontent with the organisation.

She battled an opioid addiction

Presley has been open about her well being struggles in the past, such as her sobriety journey right after suffering from an habit to opioids.

She wrote about her struggles with addiction in a foreword for the 2019 e-book, The United States Opioids.

In it, Presley wrote that she turned addicted immediately after the delivery of her twins in 2008.

Lisa Marie Presley poses with her three daughters
Lisa Marie Presley with her daughter Riley Keough and twin daughters Finley Lockwood and Harper Lockwood.(AP Photo: Jordan Strauss/Invision)

“You may possibly read through this and question how, soon after dropping people near to me, I also fell prey to opioids,” she wrote. 

“I was recovering soon after the [2008] start of my daughters, Vivienne and Finley, when a medical doctor approved me opioids for soreness.

“It only took a quick-term prescription of opioids in the clinic for me to really feel the need to retain getting them.”

She inherited Graceland immediately after Elvis died 

After her father died, Presley became the sole heir of the Elvis Presley Belief.

Along with Elvis Presley Enterprises, the trust managed Graceland: a mansion on a 13-acre estate in Memphis, Tennessee.

She retained ownership of Graceland Mansion alone, the 13 acres around it and things inside the house.

Her son is buried there, alongside with her father and other members of the Presley relatives.

Lisa Marie and Priscilla Presley would make common journeys to Graceland during huge supporter celebrations on the anniversaries of Elvis’ demise and birthday. 

ABC/AP 

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Expert on U.S. drug abuse says conditions in S.F.’s Tenderloin are tragically familiar

Expert on U.S. drug abuse says conditions in S.F.’s Tenderloin are tragically familiar

Sam Quinones, one of the nation’s foremost chroniclers of American drug abuse, took a stroll around San Francisco’s Tenderloin last week to take a hard look at the beleaguered neighborhood’s street addict scene. Like anyone else who’s taken that stroll lately, he saw the brazen fentanyl and methamphetamine use — and the grim consequences of unchecked addiction — that’s become a dispiriting calling card for that part of town.

Nothing much surprised him.

As a journalist and author covering America’s drug and homelessness epidemics for years, Quinones said what he witnessed has become alarmingly familiar across the country — and the crisis in the Tenderloin is not the uniquely San Francisco horror that locals and outside observers think it is.

“It’s not unlike several parts of the country I’ve seen,” Quinones said dryly, standing in UN Plaza while dealers hawked dope 20 feet away and a young woman squatted under an umbrella to smoke fentanyl through a straw.

“This story is the same all over the nation, because the drugs have covered the nation. It’s everywhere, and the massive supply that’s available now is the reason.”

Quinones, a former Los Angeles Times reporter and author of 2015’s best-selling “Dreamland” about the opioid epidemic, has been following the international drug trade for decades. His latest book, 2021’s “The Least of Us,” documents how synthesized fentanyl and pure meth, easily made with cheap chemicals in Mexico, have been pouring into the U.S., dominating the drug market and torquing drug addiction to new and dangerous levels.

That explosion, he said, is also helping drive a spike in homelessness around the country — because not only is fentanyl many times more powerful than heroin, but the newly more potent meth also causes extreme psychosis and instability. Both trap people in a cycle of addiction and hopelessness that makes it difficult to get off the street.

Quinones worked decades ago as a journalist in the Tenderloin, and was familiar with the city, but what he saw this week in the Tenderloin and other areas of San Francisco mirrored what he’s seen in Kentucky, Los Angeles, Reno, Portland, Ore., and Denver.

Thumper, 26, a homeless drug user, chats with author Sam Quinones at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco.

Thumper, 26, a homeless drug user, chats with author Sam Quinones at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco.

Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle

He was taken aback at the “fearless” nature of some of the drug dealers who flipped him off and threw bottles at him while he was filming them with his phone — “They were laughing and behaving like they owned the block,” he said. But the rampantly open use of dope? Same story, different city.

“This has gone beyond what any city or county can deal with,” said the 64-year-old writer, who lives in Nashville. “It’s a national poisoning. We need to understand that this is supply-driven. It’s just way too available in massive quantities. And just like with homelessness, there is no one fix.”

Known overdose deaths in San Francisco have more than doubled since 2017, to 625 in 2021, and those overwhelmingly involved fentanyl either alone or mixed into another drug, with meth close behind.

Most of the nearly 8,000 people unhoused on any given night in San Francisco don’t struggle with substance abuse — but you don’t see them, generally. The ones visibly struggling in tents or shooting up on the sidewalk are the nearly 3,000 chronically homeless folks, so called because they have been outside for at least a year and suffer from disabilities that predominantly involve drugs, alcohol or mental illness.

It’s that population that Quinones was visiting this week, researching with no particular project in mind yet. As usual, it only took minutes to find street people in crisis to talk to, particularly in the gritty Tenderloin.

“I’m stuck out here because of fentanyl, and I don’t know how to get off it,” admitted a 26-year-old woman who gave her name as Thumper and sported a tattoo reading “Booze” over her right eye. Quinones helped her up when her dog, Bubba, accidentally knocked her down in UN Plaza as he lunged toward a bird. After a quick chit-chat she spilled out a harrowing biography.

“My dad killed himself and my mom shot me up with meth when I was a kid. I’ve been homeless since I was 14. I don’t do meth any more, but let me tell you — it’s gotten so much worse now. I think you’ve got to do it more often, and it makes you crazy faster,” she said.

Quinones noted how fentanyl is more difficult to detox from than heroin, with methadone being one of the few medications that consistently helps, and Thumper vigorously shook her head. “I tried Subutex (buprenorphine) to detox and it was awful, and I couldn’t get on methodone so I tried to detox in an alley and it was hell,” she said.

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Quinones said. “The more I hear about this, the more I think there’s just this big mix of trauma and drugs.” Thumper again nodded.

One of Quinones’ biggest contentions is that a combination of personal trauma, drug addiction and mental illness commonly ensnare the most troubled unhoused people in the street, and addressing all of those problems with a broad range of approaches is the only way to make progress.

That means providing a wider variety of counseling-enriched supportive housing that tapers people off drugs and gets them away from drug-rich environments, increasing police crackdowns on drug dealing, providing intensive drug recovery programs in jail and more — ideas that are continually debated in San Francisco and other parts of the nation.

“The way to get people away from drugs is to keep people away from drugs during that very important few months when the drugs are telling them ‘you must go find me,’” Quinones said.

“Drugs hijack the brain’s instinct for self preservation. We always saw that, but these new drugs do that more completely because of their prevalence and potency. You see that every day in San Francisco, and all over the country — people who have completely lost their impulse for self preservation.”

Meanwhile, drugs are more available than ever, he said. Fentanyl may get the most publicity these days, but super-pure meth has also spiked because of the drop in price.

In 2008, meth cost about $20,000 a pound in Fresno, but today it costs between $500 and $800. Mix that with fentanyl and it’s a lot cheaper and easier to get high — most hits of meth and fentanyl cost between $1 and $5, cheaper drug highs than available 10 or 20 years ago.

But the twist is that the fairly new synthetic fentanyl — which is supplanting organic heroin as the main street opioid — has to be smoked a half-dozen times a day, at least, to stave off dope-sickness. Heroin gets the job done with two injections a day.

Thumper, 26, a homeless drug user, holds her dog, Bubba, on a leash while she chats with author Sam Quinones at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco.

Thumper, 26, a homeless drug user, holds her dog, Bubba, on a leash while she chats with author Sam Quinones at Civic Center Plaza in San Francisco.

Gabrielle Lurie / The Chronicle

“Every time Thumper smokes fentanyl she’s playing Russian roulette, six to eight times a day, and the high isn’t even as good,” Quinones said. “No heroin addict ever wanted to be a fentanyl addict. But you hardly see heroin out here any more compared to fentanyl. Synthetics have just taken over.”

Figures from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development show that unsheltered homelessness increased nationally 3.4{35112b74ca1a6bc4decb6697edde3f9edcc1b44915f2ccb9995df8df6b4364bc} between 2020 and 2022, despite billions of extra dollars spent on the problem through COVID relief. Most communities in California also saw spikes, and homelessness overall throughout the state shot up 13{35112b74ca1a6bc4decb6697edde3f9edcc1b44915f2ccb9995df8df6b4364bc} since 2019.

San Francisco was an outlier on the increases, reducing unsheltered homelessness by 15{35112b74ca1a6bc4decb6697edde3f9edcc1b44915f2ccb9995df8df6b4364bc} since 2019. But that’s due to new investments of hundreds of millions of dollars in shelters and housing — and city officials estimate that for every one homeless person who gets housed, four more take their place.

The city’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing released a study in December contending that ending unsheltered homelessness within three years would require spending an additional $1.4 billion on top of what is already budgeted. But even in that report, HSH admitted the goal is probably impossible for a lot of reasons — including that four-for-every-one estimate.

Quinones sees figures like that and blames, in large part, drugs. And in that, he sees death.

“Left on the street, people will die,” he said. “Meth will drive them mad and fentanyl will kill them. It’s not like heroin or crack. You used to be able to survive for decades on it. Not with fentanyl.”

Kevin Fagan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: kfagan@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @KevinChron

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UPDATE 2-China says talks to include Paxlovid in its health insurance drug list fail

UPDATE 2-China says talks to include Paxlovid in its health insurance drug list fail

(Provides Pfizer remark in 5th paragraph)

BEIJING, Jan 8 (Reuters) – China will not contain Pfizer Inc’s Paxlovid in an update to its listing of medicines covered by primary clinical insurance plan schemes as the U.S. agency quoted a substantial price tag for the COVID-19 drug, China’s Healthcare Safety Administration (NHSA) explained on Sunday.

The COVID-19 antiviral drug is at the moment protected by the country’s wide health care insurance plan plan less than short-term steps the regulator introduced in March last calendar year as outbreaks rose.

But authorities held talks with Pfizer in current times to determine whether to include it in the most recent version of their listing, which they update each year.

Inclusion on the list means a drug is obtainable via state insurance strategies, which will strengthen volumes but will come with the situation that suppliers decreased prices. Past rounds have found drugmakers slash prices by as a lot as 62{35112b74ca1a6bc4decb6697edde3f9edcc1b44915f2ccb9995df8df6b4364bc} just after negotiations with officials.

“We will continue to collaborate with the Chinese federal government and all relevant stakeholders to safe an sufficient source of Paxlovid in China. We stay fully commited to fulfilling the COVID-19 procedure requires of Chinese sufferers,” Pfizer said in a statement, with out elaborating.

The NHSA stated Paxlovid would go on to be eligible to be paid out for by point out clinical insurance till the present-day planned end-date to the short term steps of March 31.

When the talks on Paxlovid failed, they succeeded with two other COVID-19 procedure drugs — natural medicine Qingfei Paidu granules and Chinese drugmaker Legitimate Biotech’s Azvudine — which will be included in the list’s update, the regulator said.

Three many years into the pandemic, China commenced pivoting absent from its signature “zero COVID” coverage last thirty day period soon after historic protests towards the economically-detrimental curbs that experienced been championed by President Xi Jinping.

The unexpected loosening of limitations has fueled a giant wave of bacterial infections and prompted quite a few to change to underground channels to procure cures this kind of as Paxlovid, which a scientific trial has located to have minimized hospitalisations in significant-danger individuals by all around 90{35112b74ca1a6bc4decb6697edde3f9edcc1b44915f2ccb9995df8df6b4364bc}.

Containers of Paxlovid are shifting palms for as substantially as 50,000 yuan ($7,313.15), extra than 20 moments the primary price tag of 2,300 yuan, in accordance to local media experiences and social media posts.

Beijing has been mainly resistant to Western vaccines, but has greenlighted international oral solutions Paxlovid and Merck’s Molnupiravir. It accepted Paxlovid in February.

Reuters reported on Saturday, citing sources, that China is in talks with Pfizer to safe a licence that will enable domestic drugmakers to manufacture and distribute a generic version of Paxlovid.

Final month, China Meheco Group Co Ltd explained on Wednesday it signed an arrangement with Pfizer to import and distribute Paxlovid in mainland China.

Pfizer also signed a offer in August for Chinese drugmaker Zhejiang Huahai to produce Paxlovid in mainland China entirely for clients there. ($1 = 6.8370 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Brenda Goh, Yingzhi Yang and Roxanne Liu Modifying by Raissa Kasolowsky, Elaine Hardcastle and Daniel Wallis)

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‘Yellowstone’ star Wes Bentley opens up about drug addiction, being most ‘hated’ character on hit show

‘Yellowstone’ star Wes Bentley opens up about drug addiction, being most ‘hated’ character on hit show

“Yellowstone” actor Wes Bentley is opening up about his drug addiction and how it deeply impacted his occupation foremost up to his part on the hit present.

In a New York Moments interview, Bentley unveiled he has significant “regrets” about some of the decisions he produced on his way to stardom, together with acquiring involved with medicine. 

As the 21-year-outdated actor at the time portrayed Ricky Fitts in the 1999 film “American Splendor,” — Kevin Spacey’s pot-working neighbor — Bentley confessed he started to spiral into his drug habit amid the weeds of the amusement business.

‘YELLOWSTONE’ STAR WES BENTLEY Suggests ROBERT DOWNEY JR. ‘SAVED’ HIM WHEN HE WAS BATTLING HEROIN Habit

“It was all vampires and underdeveloped youthful people,” he described to the media outlet. 

"Yellowstone" actor Wes Bentley is opening up about his drug addiction and how it deeply impacted his career leading up to his role on the hit show.

“Yellowstone” actor Wes Bentley is opening up about his drug habit and how it deeply impacted his occupation top up to his position on the hit demonstrate.
(Getty Illustrations or photos)

After abusing medication, together with heroin, cocaine and too much alcoholic beverages, Bentley was arrested in 2008.

He pleaded guilty to possession of heroin and working with a counterfeit $100 monthly bill.

“The regrets are always going to be there,” he remarked.

Bentley recounted the time he booked a gig on “Dolan’s Cadillac” and begun to question the relaxation of his acting vocation. 

During an all-encompassing interview, Wes Bentley revealed he has major "regrets" with some of the choices he made on his way to stardom, including getting involved with drugs. 

All through an all-encompassing job interview, Wes Bentley unveiled he has main “regrets” with some of the decisions he designed on his way to stardom, such as acquiring concerned with prescription drugs. 
(Image by Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)

“This is in all probability my past performing job… I’m heading to be a drug supplier and a DJ,” he instructed the media outlet.

The “American Horror Tale” actor eventually took issues into his individual arms and extra that a close friend in the marketplace took him to “12-action meetings” to support with his addictions. 

He overcame his worries and has been sober since July 2009.

Cole Hauser, left, Luke Grimes, center, and Wes Bentley attend the premiere party For Paramount Network's "Yellowstone" season 2.

Cole Hauser, remaining, Luke Grimes, heart, and Wes Bentley go to the premiere celebration For Paramount Network’s “Yellowstone” season 2.
(Photo by Tommaso Boddi/Getty Images)

Bentley furthermore opened up about becoming one particular of the most “hated” characters on the hit display “Yellowstone.”

FOX Nation Signs Offer WITH ACTOR KEVIN COSTNER FOR ‘YELLOWSTONE: A single-FIFTY’ Collection

Bentley plays Jamie Dutton, the son of Kevin Costner’s character John Dutton, on the Paramount Community collection. 

He admitted it was not simple participating in his function on the hit present.

“He’s amazingly unfortunate,” Bentley defined.

“I have often dealt with my sadness with issues like comedy, or humor, or medications at a single level, or trying to just dismiss it and getting yet another way out of it. But you simply cannot do that when you’re attempting to portray someone’s unhappiness. You have to let it be there. Which is been the most difficult section of it all, and it’s weighed on my daily life a tiny little bit.”

Wes Bentley plays Jamie Dutton, the son of Kevin Costner’s character John Dutton on "Yellowstone."

Wes Bentley performs Jamie Dutton, the son of Kevin Costner’s character John Dutton on “Yellowstone.”
(Paramount Network)

One particular of the “Yellowstone” administrators, Stephen Kay, praised Bentley’s function on the show.

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“It’s impressive, his potential to make you mad at Jamie, make you detest him and have him crack your coronary heart at the same time,” Kay reported to the New York Occasions.

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Bentley observed that he prides himself on remaining able to go away any issues at the doorway as soon as he is finished on set however, this time around, it has been extra challenging.

“Jamie’s sadness permeates my daily life, even though I’m not sad. I’m very blessed to have a fantastic family members and be wherever I’m at in existence, but he’s generally there driving me, clawing at that, specifically when I’m shooting.”

Bentley has played Jamie Dutton since “Yellowstone” debuted in 2018.

Stephanie Giang-Paunon is an Leisure Author for Fox News Digital. Story suggestions can be sent to stephanie.giang@fox.com and on Twitter: @SGiangPaunon.

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Insomnia Medications Show Promise in Fighting Drug and Alcohol Addiction

Insomnia Medications Show Promise in Fighting Drug and Alcohol Addiction
Taking Prescription Medicine Concept

Drug and liquor dependancy is a serious and elaborate problem that impacts hundreds of thousands of people today globally. It is characterized by a solid and usually uncontrollable desire to use medicine or drink alcoholic beverages, even when undertaking so will cause destructive implications. Addiction is often accompanied by physical and psychological dependence, which can make it difficult to halt utilizing medicine or alcohol.

A research executed by Rutgers University uncovered that improvements in the mind can direct to a want for medicine and shown how specified insomnia medications may be able to avoid this habits.

Researchers at Rutgers College have found a potential biological method for drug and alcoholic beverages addiction and believe that that recent treatments for sleeplessness could most likely be utilized to minimize or reduce cravings.

An post not long ago revealed in the journal Biological Psychiatry discusses the results of scientists at the Rutgers Brain Wellbeing Institute and other institutions on the purpose of the orexin program in drug addiction. The orexin program, which regulates rest styles, reward pathways, and mood, has been identified to generate drug-looking for conduct. It has been observed that many drugs of abuse boost orexin output in both equally human and animal brains, and blocking this system can reverse habit in animals. In addition, a independent examine has proven that one of the 3 Food and drug administration-accredited insomnia remedies that block orexin can reduce opioid cravings in human topics.

“There’s even now a lot to discover about how orexin drives drug craving, but we know more than sufficient to justify testing orexin antagonists in medical trials as addiction therapies,” reported Gary Aston-Jones, coauthor of the review and director of the Brain Well being Institute. “We’re making use of for funding from the Countrywide Institutes of Wellness and seeking to employ the service of a medical professional-scientist with medical trial encounter to direct these endeavours.”

The review, which draws on a lot more than a 10 years of publications from scientists at Rutgers and peer establishments, suggests that orexin spurs drug craving and, consequently, enthusiasm to procure a drug.

Less than typical situation, lots of orexin-producing cells in the brain transform orexin manufacturing on and off in strategies that raise and lessen determination. These cells flip on when, e.g., men and women experience a restricted deadline and want to get work done and switch off at night to permit rest. Nonetheless, when folks grow to be addicted to opioids, cocaine, liquor and other substances, these cells maximize orexin production but no for a longer period convert it off. They keep on continuously, making significant concentrations of orexin that motivates one actions: getting an additional hit.

Managed research of mice, rats, zebrafish and other animals have permitted scientists to systematically look at just about every move in the approach. Postmortem evaluation of mind tissue from individuals who employed heroin demonstrates the same raise in the human orexin procedure that researchers have observed in addicted animals. As soon as brought on, this overactivity may well last endlessly – without a doubt, the analysis group noticed elevated orexin concentrations in cocaine-addicted rats that stayed sober for more than a quarter of their pure lifespan.

Earlier analysis into orexin’s snooze-blocking effects spurred the development of anti-orexin sleeplessness drugs, 3 of which have been authorised by the U.S. Food stuff and Drug Administration (Belsomra, Quviviq and Davigo). As orexin’s purpose in habit has emerged, scientists have tested these remedies as addiction remedies, mainly in animals. Investigate at Rutgers has located that reduced doses of one particular of these drugs can decrease drug-looking for habits in rats with out sedating them or impairing cognitive perform. In addition, a new review from Johns Hopkins College showed that this medicine can cut down cravings in folks detoxifying from opioids.

“There’s certainly no warranty orexin antagonists will effectively deal with addiction, but our analysis gives us superior purpose for hope,” reported Morgan James, coauthor of the overview and a professor of psychiatry at Rutgers Robert Wooden Johnson Clinical University. “And the need for helpful remedies is enormous. Overdose deaths have skyrocketed previous 100,000 a year and current procedure possibilities have limited efficacy.”

Reference: “Orexin Reserve: A Mechanistic Framework for the Purpose of Orexins (Hypocretins) in Addiction” by Morgan H. James and Gary Aston-Jones, 1 July 2022, Organic Psychiatry.
DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2022.06.027

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The silencing of drug addiction experts who criticize ‘safe supply’

The silencing of drug addiction experts who criticize ‘safe supply’

Professor says the B.C. provincial government is censoring him

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Published Jan 02, 2023  •  Last updated 18 hours ago  •  5 minute read

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Dr. Julian Somers is seen in a file photo from Vancouver's notorious Downtown Eastside.
Dr. Julian Somers, seen in a file photo from Vancouver’s notorious Downtown Eastside, alleges the provincial government is attempting to silence him because he is critical of its homelessness policies and its supply of opioids to addicts. Photo by Lori Culbert / Postmedia News

Editor’s note: This column has been updated with a response from the British Columbia Centre on Substance Use.

One of Canada’s leading experts on drug addiction says British Columbia’s provincial government asked him to delete a crucial database in an attempt to censor criticism of the province’s homeless policies. The incident appears to fit within a larger, nationwide campaign to silence experts who believe that, when it comes to homelessness and drugs, Canadian policy-makers are on the wrong track.

Dr. Julian Somers is a clinical psychologist and distinguished professor at Simon Fraser University, where he directs the Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health and Addiction.

In 2004, Somers established the “Inter-Ministry Evaluation Database” (IMED), which linked data about vulnerable populations across various B.C. ministries — for example: days spent in hospital, detentions and criminal convictions, medications, and income assistance. This helped create detailed pictures of people’s lives, allowing researchers to more accurately measure the impacts of government policies.

Over the years, the database was used in over 30 provincial reports, 60 peer-reviewed publications and several graduate theses.

Somers then used the IMED for his own $20-million research project into anti-poverty programs in Vancouver. The project randomly divided 497 participants into three groups, giving each a different support program. Using the IMED to follow their lives over five years, it concluded that B.C.’s standard approach to homelessness was ineffective.

In B.C., as in much of Canada, the popular approach is to herd homeless people into housing where most, if not all, residents are fresh off the streets, creating a critical mass of trauma and addiction. These residents are then given a “safe supply” of free drugs and provided few resources for recovery and social reintegration.

Somers’ study showed that if you house homeless people in a way that disperses them into normal society, and then prioritize rehabilitation, employment and social reintegration, you see a 70 per cent reduction in crimes committed and a 50 per cent reduction in medical emergencies, all without spending more money.

The study confirmed the common-sense notion that it’s better to empower people to get back on their feet, rather than foster dependency through easy access to free drugs.

In a phone call, Somers contrasted Canada’s approach to that of Portugal. The Portuguese are legendary for effectively tackling addiction while decriminalizing drugs, but many don’t realize that their model focuses heavily on rehabilitation.

The Portugal model model focuses heavily on rehabilitation

“Portugal has 64 therapeutic communities and zero consumption sites. British Columbia has zero therapeutic communities and 40-something consumption sites,” he noted.

Armed with his study results, Somers worked with 14 non-profits to call for reforms to B.C.’s drug and homeless policies. In late February 2021, he presented his findings to several provincial deputy ministers.

A week later, the provincial government sent him a letter demanding that he destroy the IMED within one week. The official explanation was that the database was set to be retired at the end of the month, and that the government was creating its own inter-ministry database that would be broader (i.e. include family and income data) and be more efficient to operate.

Somers found the explanation implausible, and still does.

He says there was no way to reconstruct the IMED’s core data in the new government project. Many people had consented to having their data used only because they participated in projects specifically related to the IMED, such as Somer’s aforementioned homeless study. That consent was non-transferrable.

The abrupt timing also troubled him, especially because the B.C. Ministry of Health had just renewed its commitment to the IMED for another year.

The abrupt timing troubled him

Somers refused to comply. He alleges that the government responded by simply prohibiting him from updating or analyzing the IMED, or using it for new projects, without the province’s written permission. Dr. Somers says this effectively rendered the database worthless.

Somers believes that in the nearly two years since, he has been “completely frozen out” by the B.C. government. “This government is actively hostile to the existence of the data, so I’ve completely given up. The work I was doing is no longer viable,” he says.

Somers also alleges that he has been subject to an intimidation campaign by safe supply advocates. He provided a copy of a July 2022 email from the British Columbia Centre on Substance Use, which lobbies for safe supply, showing that they lobbied for a conference to disinvite him from speaking at an academic conference. A BCCSU spokesman said, by email, that the organization raised concerns about what it viewed as the “low quality” of Somers’ research. “There was no request to disinvite the presenter,” the spokesman wrote.

However, the email to the conference organizers from BCCSU expressed hope that “this work will not be given a credible platform.”

When emailed about Dr. Somer’s allegations, the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General, which had requested the IMED’s deletion, replied that the deletion request “coincided with the expiration of relevant information sharing agreements between Dr. Somers and the Ministries,” and alluded to the superiority of the provincial government’s new, in-house database.

The Ministry also said that, in January 2022, Dr. Somers was informed that he could have continued access to the IMED until March 2023 to allow “existing projects to conclude” and “select” published findings to be replicated in the new government database.

The Ministry did not respond to my question concerning why the initial IMED deletion request was done so abruptly. The Ministry also did not respond to a direct question about Dr. Somer’s accusation of being “frozen out” of governmental communication, nor did it explain why, ten months after first ordering the deletion of all IMED data, it changed its mind and allowed Dr. Somers conditional access to the database.

Other public health and addiction experts say they are unsurprised at the suggestion that there is political pressure being placed on researchers whose findings are inconvenient for governments.

Dr. Kelly Anthony, a lecturer at the University of Waterloo’s School of Public Health Sciences, called the B.C. government’s abrupt request to delete the IMED “concerning, considering the deeply politicized nature of Dr. Somers’ work.”

She also said she wouldn’t be surprised if Somers was being punished for criticizing the government’s commitment to “safe supply.” Anthony believes safe supply is poorly researched and “consigns the addict to be a slave forever,” but says that in her experience, many academics are uncomfortable publicly criticizing it due to silencing, shunning and political pressure.

This sentiment was echoed by Dr. Vincent Lam, the medical director of Coderix Medical Clinic, an addictions clinic in downtown Toronto. Lam is not familiar with the specifics of Somers work but he has publicly criticized safe supply as irresponsible. He told me that at least 10 of his colleagues have privately messaged him to express similar concerns about the potential harms of flooding communities with free opioids. He said they all, too, shared their discomfort with speaking up in a politicized environment where experts are punished if they ask the wrong questions.

National Post

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