Washington state considers supplying drugs directly to addicts in 'safe supply' initiative

In a controversial move aimed at combating the state’s worsening opioid crisis, a Washington Health Care Authority advisory group has recommended that the state consider supplying addictive drugs directly to users to reduce overdoses and provide a so-called “safer supply.”

The Substance Use Recovery Services Advisory Committee (SURSAC), established by the Legislature in 2021, released its latest recommendations to the public on June 13. Among the proposals: a “buyers club” model that would make Washington a distributor of hard drugs, such as fentanyl and methamphetamine, under controlled conditions.

The concept is one of four safer-supply frameworks outlined in the group’s Substance Use and Recovery Services Plan. Other models include supervised injection sites, prescribing the drugs for use at home, and offering certain drugs without prescriptions at dispensaries.

SURSAC says the proposals aim to reduce overdose deaths and increase access to treatment, outreach, and recovery services for those suffering from substance use disorder. Katie Pope, deputy chief communications officer for the Health Care Authority, described the work as “strategies to reduce overdoses and improve access” in an email to The Center Square.

Rep. Travis Couture (R-Allyn) told The Center Square that Washington is “going in absolutely the wrong direction,” pointing to a state report showing a record number of drug-related deaths. According to the Department of Children, Youth & Families, 27 children under state supervision died or nearly died in the first three months of 2025, more than half of them due to fentanyl. “We see this mass human misery and suffering in our streets, and sometimes behind closed doors, and involving children,” Couture said. “While the rest of the country is kind of starting to recover from a lot of this stuff, we're the only state that's going in the opposite direction.”

Couture blasted the idea of taxpayer-funded “drug dealing,” arguing that giving out heroin, meth, and fentanyl is “not treatment, that's surrender.” He also criticized SURSAC’s perceived unwillingness to consider other approaches. “They only want to double down on the failures,” he said. “This is not only giving the drug paraphernalia and a place to do it — the government-operated drug dens, as they call them — but now they want to be the drug dealer themselves.”

The advisory committee is pushing lawmakers to approve a pilot program to test the safer supply model, potentially through a university-led clinical trial. A scaled-up version could follow if approved by the Legislature.

Couture expressed concern that Democratic leaders, including Governor Bob Ferguson, would support such policies. “We've seen this movie before,” he said. “Bob Ferguson basically pushed, throughout his career, drug legalization… These are illegal narcotics. They're dangerous. They're killing people. We should be getting rid of them, not supplying them.”

Canada has spent millions on opioid-dispensing vending machines in Vancouver, Victoria, London, Ontario, and Dartmouth. However, a March 2025 JAMA Health Forum study in British Columbia found that neither safer supply nor decriminalization reduced the opioid crisis. Instead, opioid‑related hospitalizations increased by 58 percent. Meanwhile, overdose fatalities in BC remain at record highs, and the supply is more toxic than ever.