Poppy Seeds for a Safe Supply NOW!
Poppy Seeds For A Safe Supply Now!
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Poppy Seeds For A Safe Supply Now! 〰️
A Bereaved Mother’s Day Action by Moms Stop the Harm
Moms Stop the Harm is sending one thousand Poppy Seed Packets to Canada’s Prime Minister and other members of parliament starting on April 25th to the 29th of April, 2022, in time for Bereaved Mothers Day on May 1, 2022.
For Moms Stop the Harm, poppy seeds have special meaning: they represent a safe supply of psychoactive substances.
Moms Stop the Harm is fighting to create a safe supply of substances because our loved ones continue to be harmed and to die from an increasingly toxic drug supply. The Canadian government has the ability to establish a regulated and safe supply of psychoactive substances. But, our federal government still has no National Safe Supply Strategy.
We call on the Government of Canada to provide immediate support to community-based safe supply services and organizations in the form of
Expansion and implementation of a range of safe supply approaches including those led by people who use substances (i.e. “compassion clubs”), public health models and prescriber models.
Expedited process for granting Section 56(1) exemptions to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act for community-based safe supply initiatives.
Reduce barriers to funding mechanisms such as SUAP so that urgent up-scaling of community-based safe supply organizing is enabled.
Ensure equitable access to emerging safe supply initiatives especially to intersecting
marginalized populations and those who are traditionally underserved by health initiatives.Consultation with community-based safe supply organizations and people who use substances who can inform the immediate development of community-based solutions for safe supply.
Why does Canada need Safe Supply?
Moms Stop the Harm is disappointed with the lack of urgency in the response from the Federal government to the harm and deaths of our loved ones. More than 26,000 of our loved ones have been killed just since 2016 by toxic substances flooding the illicit market. Canada’s prohibition policies are driving the increasingly toxic illicit drug market. Yet, the Federal government did not even mention this public health crisis when the Prime Minister mandated his cabinet’s work after the last election in 2021. This government’s inaction on the toxic drug crisis and inability to develop a safe supply strategy has led us to see that we need more actions and more advocates to get a National Safe Supply Strategy built and implemented.
The Government of Canada must urgently work with people who use drugs and their communities to urgently move forward on the creation of a National Safe Supply Strategy. A Strategy at the Federal level should enable the development and distribution of pharmaceutical-grade substances, regulate the trade in now-illicit substances and provide people who use drugs with the low-barrier access, knowledge and information needed to make and act on informed decisions about substances.
Communities are already organizing to bring safe consumption sites, drug testing services and compassion clubs to people in Canada. Until we can create a regulatory framework that enables the manufacture and distribution of regulated substances, these community-based initiatives are the most important defense against the harms of our toxic drug supply. But, these community organizations face many barriers to extending their services. Many people across Canada have no access to safe supply even as the toxicity of substances in the illicit market grows. Community-based organizations working in safe supply and harm reduction must receive support for expansion from our federal government as an urgent short-term step toward regaining the autonomy and control that’s been lost to prohibition and the illicit market.
Why Poppy Seeds?
Seeds show us that our world constantly re-creates potential and life-to-be. They symbolize latent power and the growth that can come when potential finds the right conditions.
Poppies are known for the gifts of their fruits: the opiates opium, morphine and heroin. At one time, people grew poppies and produced opiates for their communities’ use in ritual, social, psychological and recreational activities.
People once understood and practiced poppy cultivation, but governments tore away people’s knowledge and outlawed the work of poppy cultivation. Poppies were among the first substances targeted by racist, anti-drug militants and then, in the 1800’s, by government legislation outlawing poppy production.
As a source of regeneration, poppy seeds show us that we can recreate conditions for our loved ones that
are better and safer than the illicit toxic drug supply that criminalization has created.
A BIG thank you to our members who put together the poppy seed envelopes and who mailed them out to the Prime Minister: Leslie McBain Pender Island B.C., Jenny Howard Victoria B.C., Deb Bailey Vancouver B.C., Tracy Letts Langley B.C, Lizzy O Sullivan Westminster B.C., Angela Welz Edmonton AB., Marie Agioritis Saskatoon SK., Willi McCorriston SK., Arlene Last-Kolb Winnipeg, MB., Christine Wingate ON., Missy McClean ON., Charlene Vacon QC., Emily Bodechon NB., Katie Upham NS., Mary Kilroy NL, Mary Linda NS., Mark Ferguson PEI.