MA Substance Use Bill Will Not Include Safe Injection Sites, China Warns US on "Smears" over Fentanyl, More... (12/18/24)

Canada will tighten its borders in the face of Trump tariff threats, opium production falls slightly in Myanmar, and more. 

Myanmar is now once again the world's leading opium producer even though production declined slightly from last year. (UNODC)

Harm Reduction

Massachusetts Addiction Treatment Bill Will Not Include Safe Injection Sites. After months of negotiations, lawmakers have filed a compromise addiction and drug treatment bill, House Bill 5143, that does not include safe injection sites, which originally had been part of the measure.

Reps. Alice Peisch (D) and Adrian Madaro (D) and Sen. Brendan Crighton (D) filed the bill Tuesday afternoon. Madaro and Crighton are co-chairs of the conference committee charged with drafting the bill. 

The safe injection site provision was included in the Senate draft of the bill but not the House version and lawmakers pointed to contention over that provision as a key factor in delaying the filing of the bill. 

The provision had the support of the Department of Public Health, with Public Health Commissioner Robbie Goldstein calling the sites "lifelines, serving not only as places of intervention, but as places of empathy, understanding, and healing."

Both branches are in session on Thursday, and the House will have the first chance to take up the measure.

The compromise legislation aims to limit the toll of addiction and substance use disorder. Even though drug overdose deaths have declined in the state over last year, more than 2,000 state residents died of overdoses in 2023. The bill would boost access to overdose reversal drugs, including by requiring insurance companies to cover the cost of emergency use of the overdose reversal drug naloxone and requiring hospitals to provide patients with a history of drug use at least two doses of naloxone when they are discharged. 

The House is debating the bill this week.

International

China Criticizes US Politicians' "Smears" of Its Anti-Drug Efforts. A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman has lashed out at US lawmakers on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party for a trio of bills they have offered to target "China's role in the fentanyl crisis."

The three bills produced by the committee's Fentanyl Working Group are the  Joint Task Force to Counter Illicit Synthetic Narcotics Act of 2024, The CCP Fentanyl Sanctions Act, and the International Protecting from PRC Fentanyl and Other Synthetic Opioids Act.

The first bill would allow US authorities to cut off Chinese companies from the banking system, including vessels, ports, and online marketplaces that "knowingly or recklessly" aid the shipment of illicit synthetic drugs. The other two bills would create a US task force to disrupt drug trafficking networks and allow for civil penalties on Chinese companies that "fail to properly manifest or follow formal entry channels when shipping precursors to the US."

In response to a press question about the bills, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Lin Jian said China will not accept distortions and disinformation from American politicians to smear China's anti-drug efforts. American politicians need to look for the root causes of drug abuse at home, Lin said, and take more practical measures to reduce demand and strengthen drug control rather than scapegoating other countries. 

"Every day, China's counternarcotics authorities fight the illicit diversion of precursor chemicals in strict accordance with law and make sure that relevant companies do their business in accordance with the laws and regulations," Lin noted. 

The US is playing with fire in criticizing China's cooperation on fentanyl, said Li Haidong, a professor at China Foreign Affairs University. China's cooperation on fentanyl is a gesture of good will, he said, and if the US retaliates against China, it would "certainly affect China's willingness to continue cooperating with the US and will create obstacles for future drug control collaboration" he warned. 

Canada Announces Tougher Border Security After Trump Tariff Threat. Following President-elect Donald Trump's threat to impose a 25 percent tariff on Canadian goods, Canada has responded with a promise to impose sweeping new security measures on its border with the US, including more surveillance and a joint strike force to target transnational organized crime. The finance minister said Canada will spend $900 million on the effort. 

Trump vowed to impose tariffs if Canada does not block the flow of undocumented migrants and illegal drugs across the border. (Both immigrant and drug flows across the Canadian border are minuscule compared to the border with Mexico.)

Minister Dominic LeBlanc said on Tuesday that Canada's response "will secure our border against the flow of illegal drugs and irregular migration while ensuring the free flow of people and goods that are at the core of North America's prosperity."

The plan includes disrupting the fentanyl trade, new tools for Canadian law enforcement, deeper cooperation with US law enforcement, more information sharing, and limiting traffic at the border. It includes a proposed aerial surveillance task force between ports of entry, new drug dog teams, and detection tools to find illicit drugs.

LeBlanc said the "joint strike force" would include "support in operational surges, dedicated synthetic drug units, expanded combined forces, special enforcement units, binational integrated enforcement teams, and new operational capacity and infrastructure." He also said he and other officials had met with incoming Trump border czar Tom Homan, infamous as the architect of the child separation policy in the first Trump administration, and that he was "encouraged by that conversation."

Myanmar Still World's Leading Opium Producer, But Production Has Fallen for First Time Since 2021 Coup. With the Taliban-imposed ban on opium still largely intact in Afghanistan, Myanmar is the world's largest opium producer, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) said in a new report. But for the first time since the military coup of 2021, production has declined UNODC said. 

Myanmar led the world with 1,080 tons of opium produced in 2023, but that figure declined to 995 tons this year, UNODC said. 

The cause of the decrease was not increased enforcement but increased conflict. There was a "strong  correlation" between reduced harvests and escalating violence in traditional poppy-growing regions, UNODC said. In Shan State where about 80 percent of the crop is produced, fighting has forced many farmers to flee their fields. 

UNODC also suggested that a glut in the regional heroin market and shifts in the global heroin supply chain may have reduced demand for opium exports and led to price drops. But this year's harvest was still the second largest in the last two decades and a key source of income in a war-torn economy.