About one-third of the Vancouver Police Department’s frontline officers hadn’t completed training on decriminalization when the pilot project came into force and small amounts of drugs became legal in January 2023.

B.C.’s Ministry of Health and Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General had put together a webinar called “Decriminalization in B.C.: Shifting to a Health Approach to Substance Use,” which they sent to police departments in December 2022.

The training was designed to get officers up to speed on the Health Canada exemption that let people 18 and older carry a combined total of 2.5 grams of opioids, crack, powder cocaine, meth and ecstasy (which is also known as MDMA).

The webinar was also meant to help officers understand what health-care options people who use drugs had

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