What do many U.S. residents think of when they hear the words Canada and Canadian? Polite people? Low crime rates? Nationally funded health care? Hockey? Beer?
The truth is, Canada is a huge country with a diverse population. It’s impossible to reduce such a complex nation and people to just a few words, a few easy, inaccurate stereotypes.
In some respects, though, Canada is like other nations. One of these ways is alcohol and drug abuse. In 2015, Teen Challenge Canada reported that substance use disorder contributes to 47,000 deaths every year.
Canada’s estimated population was about 35.5 million people in 2015. Meanwhile, drugs contributed to the deaths of 52,404 people in the United States in 2015, while the estimated population of that country was about 321.4 million people in 2015.
Such statistics indicate that although the United States has ten times the population of Canada, the United States only had about 5,000 more drug deaths. These figures are alarming, indeed.
The statistics don’t improve when it comes to Canadians and alcohol. According to the Canadian Centre on Substance Use Disorder (CCSA), in 2012, an estimated 886,000 Canadians (about 3.2 percent of people fifteen or older) were dependent on alcohol or abused it. That’s almost one million people.
Does this mean the stereotype of Canadians and beer might have some kernel of truth to it? More likely, it could mean that alcohol abuse can be a big problem, no matter where you go.
Of course, all sorts of help is also available for such problems. The Canadian government has created a number of publications about addiction and care, including information about best practices relating to treatment. It also provides materials about preventing substance use disorder in the first place.
The Canadian government also allows safe injection sites to operate in Vancouver in the province of British Columbia. Safe injection sites allow addicts to inject drugs and offer clean needles and medical supervision in the event that the drug users experience medical complications.
Such endeavors demonstrate that although Canada does have problems relating to substance use disorder, it is also searching for ways to solve them.
