The RCMP VS Insite

Just a little reality check clarification: The scandal isn't that the RCMP paid for research, it's that they paid for a specific conclusion.

VANCOUVER — Newly released e-mails show the RCMP tried to discredit Vancouver's supervised-injection clinic and are part of a pattern of interference in science by the federal government, a renowned AIDS researcher says.

“Now we have documentation of what we sort of knew,” said Julio Montaner, the director of B.C.'s Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS, referring to RCMP e-mails released this week by Vancouver's Pivot Legal Society.

One refers to the “Centre for Excrements” and another, in relation to an RCMP-commissioned report on Insite, notes that “as per our request, the report has no reference to the RCMP.”

That 2007 report by Colin Mangham concluded that Insite-related research was skewed and that the clinic was having little or no effect on drug-overdose deaths or public disorder.

Detractors have slammed Dr. Mangham's report as an opinion piece and noted his role as director with the Drug Prevention Network of Canada, which takes a hard line against use of illegal drugs.