Compassionate Intervention Act Will Harm Everyone

Posted by 9sc on April 20, 2025

Why Alberta's Forced Addiction Treatment Law is Dangerous, Ineffective, and Costly

The Alberta government, under the United Conservative Party (UCP), is pushing forward with the controversial Compassionate Intervention Act. This legislation enables authorities to forcibly detain individuals suffering from addiction and mandate their participation in treatment—without consent. Federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has also endorsed this model, proposing it as a nationwide solution if he becomes Prime Minister.
The optics of this policy are clear - it's being sold as a tough-on-crime, save-lives initiative. The reality, however, is far more troubling. Forced addiction treatment has been shown repeatedly to be ineffective, dangerous, and outrageously expensive - all at the taxpayers' expense.
Proven Harmful, Not Helpful
Numerous peer-reviewed studies and health expert analyses have concluded that involuntary addiction treatment leads to worse outcomes. In fact, forced detoxification can increase the risk of overdose. When tolerance is reduced during forced abstinence, the risk of a fatal overdose upon relapse - especially with opioids - is significantly higher.
A 2020 study published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence concluded that "mandated treatment is not associated with reduced substance use, and may increase mortality risk post-treatment."
In British Columbia, a province that previously attempted forced treatment for youth under its Mental Health Act, experts from health authorities and academic institutions issued warnings after spikes in overdoses and reported trauma from those detained. The program was eventually abandoned due to both its ineffectiveness and the harms it caused.
The Numbers Don’t Support the Policy
Consider the scale of addiction in Canada:
  • 6 million Canadians aged 15+ have experienced a substance use disorder.
  • In 2024 alone (as of September), 50,928 opioid deaths have occurred since 2016.
  • 2,308 stimulant-related deaths were recorded in 2022.
  • Benzodiazepines contributed to 30% of opioid-related deaths in 2023.
  • Relapse rates range from 37.8% for alcohol to 83.4% for methamphetamines.
What does this mean? It means that the majority of those with addiction issues will relapse at some point. If treatment is court-ordered, every relapse becomes a legal violation. For people already living in poverty or on the streets, this will effectively criminalize their illness and fast-track them into Alberta’s already overburdened jail system. Think about how this would play out at the national level.
Taxpayer Burden and Systemic Collapse
Incarcerating individuals for breaking a court-ordered treatment mandate costs more than offering evidence-based community care. According to the Office of the Correctional Investigator, the average annual cost per inmate in Canada is over $120,000. That number skyrockets for individuals with mental health or substance-related issues, due to additional needs.
Implementing and maintaining an involuntary treatment system also requires significant investment in facilities, law enforcement coordination, medical staff, and ongoing legal oversight. Yet the outcomes don’t justify the expense.
These funds would be better spent on low-barrier, voluntary treatment programs, safe supply initiatives, supervised consumption services, and housing-first strategies—all of which have shown measurable success in harm reduction.
Legal and Ethical Concerns
This policy undermines personal autonomy and informed consent, core principles in both medical ethics and Canadian law. When treatment is no longer voluntary, it ceases to be therapeutic and becomes punitive. It opens the door to systemic abuse, especially when applied disproportionately to marginalized populations, including Indigenous communities and those experiencing homelessness.
A Road to Nowhere
The UCP and federal Conservatives are using addiction as a political pawn. Rather than follow proven, evidence-based strategies, they are choosing optics over outcomes. Forced treatment may sound decisive, but it’s a false solution—one that risks lives, squanders public money, and ultimately clogs a system already at the breaking point.
We don’t need incarceration dressed up as compassion. We need scalable, humane, and effective approaches that respect human dignity and actually work.
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