Meeting the Critical Needs of the Canadian Healthcare System
As the world started to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic during 2022–2023, our organization looked to meet the critical needs of the people whose substance use health was most affected by the unexpected and challenging disruption of their lives.
With the expertise and contributions of our partners, CCSA concentrated our efforts for the fiscal year on three core areas where we could have the most impact in a completely non-partisan way. Our 2022–2023 Annual Report, Meeting Critical Needs: Evidence with Impact addresses our important role in informing and supporting Canada’s healthcare system in:
- Public health,
- Policy and
- Healthcare delivery and supporting healthcare professionals.
Public Health
Last fiscal year, many of our projects impacted the current substance use health landscape in our country, including:
- Providing people in Canada with the insight they need to make informed decisions about their alcohol consumption by releasing Canada’s Guidance on Alcohol and Health: Final Report in January 2023. The release brought CCSA unprecedented national and international media attention, including 3,500 published articles and 160 interviews with CCSA staff and other members of the research team in the first three months.
- Reducing stigma with the release of and subsequent presentations on the Stigma Primer for Journalists: A Guide to Better Reporting on Substance Use and the People It Impacts in partnership with CAPSA (Community Addictions Peer Support Association).
Policy
We also focused on projects where the evidence would inform all levels of government, law enforcement and healthcare organizations as they formulated critical policy in the post-pandemic world. This Included:
- Updating and improving the Canadian Substance Use Costs and Harms study with more recent estimates, more comprehensive data sources, new types of costs and harms, and the latest international evidence on the health impacts of substance use. It is the culmination of almost two years of collaborative work with the University of Victoria’s Canadian Institute of Substance Use Research.
- Developing 34 indicators from nine data sources that have the potential to standardize drug-impaired driving (DID) data collection across jurisdictions in Measuring the Impact of Drug-Impaired Driving: Recommendations for National Indicators. The report reflects the contributions of more than 100 DID experts across the country to help strengthen efforts to reduce drug-impaired driving–related injuries and deaths with high-quality evidence.
- Exploring the development of A Standard THC Unit and Its Value in Cannabis Research, Public Education and Regulation in Canada by hosting a virtual discussion with experts from across the country.
Healthcare Delivery and Supporting Healthcare Professionals
Our healthcare system and the people who work in it continue to deal with the ongoing challenges of dual public health emergencies: the COVID-19 pandemic and the toxic drug crisis. We provided evidence of the impact of the pandemic on the harm reduction workers who care for those most in need by:
- Sharing the magnitude of the challenges faced by harm reduction workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and drug toxicity emergency with Experiences of Harm Reduction Service Providers During Dual Public Health Emergencies in Canada.
- Calling attention to the growing presence of nitazenes and xylazine as contaminants in Canada’s unregulated drug supply by publishing two alerts from the Canadian Community Epidemiology Network on Drug Use (CCENDU).
Moving Ahead Amid Uncertainty.
We continue to move past the pandemic and are trying to determine what the new normal is. If the pandemic showed us anything, it was that the substance use health systems in place now were not built for the people they are supposed to serve. We need systems that offer support and solutions, not create more barriers.
CCSA will continue to work with partners, experts, governments and people with lived or living experience of substance use to break down these barriers and find solutions that work for the people who need them.
View annual reports from previous years: