Weren’t these battles already won in the 1970s?

By Letter to the Editor on March 9, 2020.

The report on supervised consumption sites in Alberta is out and I just heard the health minister say that there was an increase of “social diseases” around these sites. I immediately thought of the song “Officer Krupke” from “West Side Story” where a young blames his bad ways on having a “social disease.” This is a musical from the 1970s. I notice that we are fighting many battles that I thought we had already won back then.

Why are we talking about conversion therapy, abortion and now social disease? I find the last one insulting and degrading. There is a debate about how to treat addiction; I feel what works for individuals works for that individual.

Saying that there is more people addicted to meth in Medicine Hat doesn’t help someone who is addicted to fentanyl. The proposed site site in Medicine Hat was going to be an inhalation site which would have included meth users.

I feel lately we are being attacked on all sides by this government, and I feel like staying home and in my comfort zone.

And to think, this government hasn’t even been in a year yet. This is getting scary.