Carlyn Zwarenstein

Carlyn is the author of On Opium: Pain, Pleasure, and Other Matters of Substance—a book about pain, opioids, harm reduction and the overdose crisis. She’s based in Toronto.

The Right-Wing Backlash to Harm Reduction in Canada

To harm reductionists in the United States, Canada can sound like a bastion of progressive, evidence-based drug policies. Naloxone is…

July 11, 2023

Environmental Ruin, Aided by Drug War: How Can Defenders Fight Back?

Land use and control, combined with prohibition, is the fundamental motor driving environmental harm relating to production and sales of…

March 23, 2023

How the Global Drug War Threatens Environmental Defenders

The global drug war provides a golden opportunity for land-grabs that trample on human rights and sensitive ecosystems. Corporations, formally…

February 9, 2023

How the Drug War Fosters Devastating Land-Grabs

Few, if any of us, remain unaware of how industries can inflict catastrophic environmental damage—on renewable and nonrenewable resources from…

January 23, 2023

The State of Research on Cannabis as an Opioid “Exit Drug”

It’s legal for adult use in 19 states, two territories and DC, and for medical use in 37 states, four…

September 29, 2022

The Ways We “Monsterize” Drug Use, Pain and People

[This article is an adapted excerpt from On Opium: Pain, Pleasure, and Other Matters of Substance, which was published in…

November 30, 2021

Compassion Clubs Advance Toward Authorization in Vancouver

The headlines suggested that sanctioned heroin clubs were coming imminently to Vancouver, British Columbia. The truth is a little different.…

October 27, 2021

The Price of Saving a Life: Naloxone’s Cost Barrier in the US

When I walk into my local pharmacy to pick up a naloxone kit, I don’t need to present a prescription.…

April 29, 2021

How a Canadian Decriminalization Model Can Improve on Portugal

Isolation, drug-supply disruptions and other effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have sent North America’s already-high overdose rates soaring. Here in…

October 6, 2020

Housing First and the Homelessness Crisis: What Went Wrong?

"The homeless crisis interested me,” says Mary Duffy of the time before she herself became homeless in Texas. “I wouldn’t…

July 23, 2020