The provincial NDP says Ontario needs a strategy to deal with drug overdoses in Ontario.

Public Health Canada reports more than 2,200 overdose-related deaths across the province last year.

NDP MPP Robin Lennox says many more want help but cannot get it.

“Individuals and families continue to struggle to access substance use treatment when they need it,” says Lennox.

“We’ve seen a lack of investment in quality community-based treatment. We’ve seen escalating wait times for detox and residential treatment programs and huge discrepancies in care options available, particularly in northern and remote regions of Ontario.”

Lennox points to the government’s decision to close safe injection sites and deny further openings, and replace them with Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) Hubs.

She says substance use treatment is more difficult to access, as the sites were not given adequate funding or provincial direction to hit the ground running.

“The majority of HART Hubs don’t have their doors open, and the ones that do are only resourced to offer minimal programming,” says Lennox.

The NDP advocate for a task force to study the scope of the problem and determine the needed investments.

“What we’re saying is that we need to actually have a strategy that looks at what the scope of the crisis is, what communities are affected and allows communities to decide where they need services and what type of services and supervised consumption sites absolutely need to be part of that.”

Lennox says harm reduction interventions and treatment programs are needed but should not be one or the other.