But Thursday's B.C. budget had no new money to expand safe supply or address the toxic drug, mental-health and homeless crises.

Substance-users who got drugs vetted for fatal contaminants from a now-closed compassion club significantly reduced their overdose rates, keeping them alive during the fatal drug overdose crisis, says a University of B.C. professor involved in newly released research.

The findings, published Thursday in an international drug-policy research journal, tracked 47 participants of a compassion club run by the Drug User Liberation Front (DULF), which received Vancouver Coastal Health funding to test drugs in a University of Victoria lab before selling them to members in a Downtown Eastside storefront in Vancouver