At the end of the day, many of the shoppers and retailers head home to the suburbs. A study published in the B.C. Medical Journal estimates there are 4,700 injection drug users in the Downtown Eastside and a total of 12,000 to 15,000 injection drug users throughout the Lower Mainland.
Drug overdose deaths in different communities are one way to measure the impact.
A 1999 study found about 70 per cent of Fraser Valley residents newly diagnosed as having HIV infection were injection drug users. If you think the drug problem is localized to just the Downtown Eastside, then you are on drugs. Yet another indicator are the calls for more drug-treatment facilities and needle exchange centres in the suburbs. Almost 40 per cent of the 400 people now getting substance counselling from the West Coast Alternatives in North Vancouver are cocaine users. Fifteen years ago, the non-profit substance abuse counselling service saw no cocaine users.