Summary
While working for two decades on Vancouver’s Downtown East Side, Dr. Gabor Maté saw how the purely medical model of addiction theory fails to take into account the effects of trauma and the biopsychosocial conditions of human beings as they live in relationship with others. He argues that current Canadian social and criminal policy exacerbate and entrench addiction, criminal behaviour and human suffering. He calls for social policy, medical training and criminal justice to become more fully aligned with the current science and understanding of addiction and healing.