Health Minister Christine Elliott says it is not the province’s job to catch pharmacists who deal drugs, including powerful opioids that are contributing to an epidemic of fatal overdoses.

Elliott made the claim despite the fact that every dose of opioids dispensed by a pharmacy in Ontario is tracked by a government monitoring system that could — but doesn’t — flag suspicious activity.

Interviewed outside of the legislative chamber Thursday, Elliott deflected responsibility for identifying drug-dealing pharmacists, pointing instead to the federal government and the professional regulator.

They, in turn, pointed back.

“The system we have set up in Ontario was never meant to deal with the use and distribution ... of medications. That’s a federal responsibility,” said Elliott. “The Ontario College of Pharmacists is also responsible for dealing with pharmacists who are dealing inappropriately in narcotics.”

That response, said NDP Leader Andrea Horwath, is an “unbelievable” dereliction of provincial duty.

Read more: Drug-dealing pharmacists are feeding Ontario’s opioid crisis

“We know that there are systems in place that should have been catching these ... pharmacists. To have a minister say, ‘That’s not my job,’ it’s unbelievable, frankly. It is exactly her job. And it’s the job of the government to deal with this,” Horwath said.

“It’s irresponsible to not step up to the plate when you know that by not doing so you’re letting criminal activity to continue on your watch.”

A Toronto Star/Global News investigation published this week revealed that only 15 pharmacists have been caught dealing drugs in Ontario in the last five years. During that same period, more than 2.6 million doses of opioids were reported missing from pharmacy shelves, suggesting more pharmacists could be diverting potent medications like fentanyl onto the street.

Not one of the 15 pharmacists caught dealing drugs was flagged by Ontario’s Narcotics Monitoring System (NMS). The Narcotics Monitoring system handbook states that “the collected data will be reviewed and analyzed by the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care for a variety of purposes including ... reporting possible criminal conduct to law enforcement agencies.”

Data from the NMS, obtained by the Star and Global News via a freedom of information request, shows that a handful of pharmacists across the province are dispensing massive quantities of powerful opioids.

Last year, just 17 pharmacists dispensed a total of more than 10,000 maximum strength oxycodone pills; five pharmacists dispensed over 4,000 hydromorphone tablets.

One pharmacist in Simcoe-Muskoka doled out more than 12,000 fentanyl patches last year. A pharmacist in Thunder Bay dispensed more than 5,700.

A single patch treats a patient with extreme pain and a high opioid tolerance for three days. For someone who hasn’t built up a tolerance for opioids, a single patch could be fatal.

There’s no indication the province investigated these large quantities of opioids.

“What’s the point of having a registry if you’re not going to keep an eye on it? What’s the point of tracking these drugs if nobody is going to actually look at the data to determine if there’s a problem,” said Horwath. “We have the data, and it’s just been sitting on the shelf gathering dust.”

“These numbers show that there’s a problem and there’s a lack of serious attention being paid to that problem. The sad thing is that we’ve lost so many lives in the meantime,” she said.

The Ontario College of Pharmacists, which sanctioned each of the 15 pharmacists caught dealing drugs, investigates pharmacists for wrongdoing following complaints.

“The College relies on information reported to us from law enforcement, other regulatory agencies such as Health Canada, the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, health professionals and members of the public,” the statement read.

In a written statement Thursday, Health Canada said, “Mitigating the diversion of opioids and other narcotics is the shared responsibility of many stakeholders including Health Canada, provinces and territories, provincial pharmacy colleges and law enforcement.”

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

Health Canada inspectors visit pharmacies across the country to assess record-keeping and security measures related to the handling of controlled substances.

In 2016/2017, only three per cent of pharmacies in Ontario were inspected.

A Health Canada spokesperson previously said that it received only 17 suspicious activity reports about pharmacies from 2013-2017. Six of the pharmacies were inspected and none were referred to law enforcement for criminal charges.