Drug User Liberation Front co-founder surprised by lack of ‘urgency’ from Health Canada on crisis

A co-founder of Vancouver’s Drug Users’ Liberation Front (DULF) said he was surprised by Health Canada’s lack of “urgency” over the deadly toxic drug crisis, and the absence of a pharmaceutical-grade supplier meant the club had to turn to the dark web for pure substances.

Jeremy Kalicum continued his testimony in a constitutional challenge to Canada’s drug laws in the British Columbia Supreme Court on Wednesday.

Kalicum, a public health researcher, said the club’s original engagement with Health Canada proposed two models for its operation, and the preferred option would have been to source pharmaceutical-grade heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.

Under cross-examination by Crown attorney Oren Bick, Kalicum said DULF was hoping to find a way to get a pharmaceutical supplier, but “the current regulatory framework prevented them from doing so.”

SEE | Kalicum talks about the positive impact DULF had on its members:

A positive impact for members

Compassion Club co-founder Jeremy Kalicum says group members benefited from having access to a predictable, untainted supply of drugs such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.

He told the court the group wanted to find a way to work with Health Canada to operate the drug “compassion club,” testing illicit drugs and supplying high-purity substances to club members to reduce overdoses.

“We were desperately trying to find a way to make it work,” he said.

Without the option of a licensed supplier, Kalicum said the other proposal was to obtain medications from the dark web.

He said Health Canada “did not want to engage with anyone on a public health proposal in the middle of the worst public health emergency to hit British Columbia.”

“What surprises me is the lack of urgency and seriousness in the consideration of the proposal,” he said.

The court heard earlier on Wednesday that the club’s founders felt “invincible” and hoped media coverage of their operation would stimulate public conversation.

But Kalicum said he now believes the publicity led to their arrests.

He told the court that he and co-founder Eris Nyx were uncomfortable interacting with the media, but coverage of the club’s operations contributed to public knowledge and aligned with its principles of transparency and accountability.

The club obtained funding from the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, which it said paid for drug testing, but drugs obtained from the dark web were purchased with donations and sold to members at cost.

Bick asked Kalicum if he thought the club’s media visibility, which included a high-profile article in The Economist magazine, brought with it an “increased risk of arrest.”

Kalicum said they knew advertising was risky and that the agreements they had meant they had to be careful about what they told reporters.

“Part of our funding agreement is that we stayed silent about having a waiver, we stayed quiet about having funding,” he said. “And I think what really brought us down was the government’s involvement.”

The court heard the compassion club operated between August 2022 and October 2023, and received $200,000 in annual funding from the health authority for drug control and overdose prevention services.

But DULF went further by purchasing and testing drugs to distribute and prevent overdoses.

Kalicum said that no medications were purchased with money from health authorities, that medication purchases were funded by donations and that sales were made at cost to club members.

The co-founders were found guilty this month on charges of drug possession for the purpose of trafficking, but their sentencing is on hold until the constitutional challenge is decided.

Kalicum told the court he now believes interacting with the media and putting the club in the public eye is what led to their arrests, and feels they were “thrown under the bus by multiple institutions.”

Bick questioned Kalicum about the data and research they were producing and conducting on more than three dozen club members who accessed drugs and the club site, and said they released information about the club to be transparent about their work.

A post on DULF’s website, dated March 3, 2025, says its legal challenge seeks to show that a section of the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act that prohibits the possession of drugs for the purposes of trafficking is unconstitutional and that “its application is killing the very people it is intended to protect.”