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B.C.’s chief doctor says Canada’s addiction-treatment system is broken

Feb 22, 2017 | 12:33 PM

VANCOUVER — British Columbia’s chief medical officer says far more needs to be done to bridge the divide between mental-health and addiction treatment in order to tackle Canada’s growing overdose crisis.

Speaking at a Canadian Mental Health Association conference in Vancouver, Perry Kendall says too often patients are sent back and forth between the two fields and told to fix their other problem first.

Kendall says it is inaccurate to say Canada’s treatment system is broken because that implies there was a system to begin with.

B.C. has been ground zero for Canada’s opioid crisis, and more than 900 people died from illicit drug overdoses last year.