Support Ophelia's Fight for Treatment

Ophelia is a 21-year-old Calgarian who lives with severe opioid use disorder. Since 2021, she has been on a specialized treatment regime offered by the Opioid Dependency Clinic at the Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre.

The treatment regime provides Ophelia with a prescription for hydromorphone — a potent, pharmaceutical grade opioid — and allows Ophelia to take it home and use it according to her schedule to combat her symptoms and live a normal life.

Ophelia requires consistent access to her hydromorphone, as her scheduled dosage times are early in the morning and she lives more than a two hour commute from the Opioid Dependency Clinic. This treatment regime is flexible and accommodates Ophelia’s unique circumstances while allowing her to effectively manage her condition and ultimately stop consuming toxic street-sourced opioids during an unprecedented overdose and drug poisoning crisis in Alberta.

In October 2022, the Government of Alberta established the Community Protection and Opioid Stewardship Standards, enacted through a series of amendments to the Mental Health Services Protection Regulation and the Mental Health Services Protection Act.

The Community Protection and Opioid Stewardship Standards prohibit Ophelia from taking her hydromorphone home to consume according to her set schedule. Instead, Ophelia will be restricted to accessing her hydromorphone exclusively at the pharmacy associated with the Opioid Dependency Clinic, which has limited hours of operation.

The Community Protection and Opioid Stewardship Standards are impractical and restrictive for Ophelia, and will result in her no longer accessing the only form of treatment that is effective for her severe opioid use disorder. Without access to this life-saving treatment, Ophelia will disengage from her prescribed care and return to street-sourced opioid consumption, increasing her likelihood of overdose death and other serious harms related to street-sourced opioid use.

Ophelia has bravely taken a stand against the Alberta Government and has filed a lawsuit seeking an exemption to the restrictive and harmful Community Protection and Opioid Stewardship Standards.

While Ophelia's hydromorphone treatment has created stability in her life, she has no money to pay for the lawyer fees and costs of this lawsuit to stop the Alberta Government from eliminating the only treatment that has helped with her severe opioid use disorder.

Our goal of $10,000.00 will help cover the costs of the lawsuit, as well as cover any potential adverse costs against Ophelia by the Alberta Government.

Please help by donating what you can.