Ontario mom, whose daughter died of overdose, wants UN to decriminalize drugs
Donna May is on a mission. The Sault Ste. Marie woman is in New York — along with four other Canadian families — to address a special United Nations Session on the World Drug Problem.
Their message: the war on drugs isn't working and it's time to consider decriminalization.
My daughter would probably say, 'Finally. Finally, the voice of those who are the most vulnerable are being heard.'- Donna May, mother of Jac, who died at 35-years-old
"We have more incarceration, more illness, more deaths than we've ever had in any other epidemic. It's time for a different approach," May tells As it Happens host Carol Off. "The evidence shows that by treating it as a health care and human care issue, we can actually combat this successfully,"
May has seen the effects of drug addiction up close. Her daughter, Jac, died in 2012 after becoming addicted to OxyContin and then fentanyl. Jac was 35-years-old when she died. She left three children behind.
May is one the founding member of the organization MumsDU — Moms United and Mandated to Saving the Lives of Drug Users.
At the UN this week, May hopes to see a new approach to the way that the international community deals with individuals who have substance abuse problems.
"My daughter would probably say, 'Finally. Finally, the voice of those who are the most vulnerable are being heard,'" says May.
"That's the gift that my daughter gave me — teaching me that she is a person with human rights and deserves and needs to be treated as such. If you take away the human connection and leave people on their own devices to find their way out of an opiate addiction, you're actually sentencing them to death."