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Many of them are homeless or vulnerable. “People are living on the streets. They have to deal with horrible people with guns and knives … They’re prostituting themselves, they’re stealing, they’re in jail, they’re out of jail.

“We get them on methadone, they start doing better. But they’re using marijuana. They’re using marijuana because they feel better on marijuana. I’m not saying that’s good or bad. I’m just saying that’s what they tell me. So now they’re on methadone and marijuana, and they’re doing pretty well, considering where they were at.

“But now guess what? They gotta go on the street to the same idiots they used to buy their pills from, they used to buy their crack from, (who) are selling their weed. They have to go back into the red zone area to buy weed from these same idiots. So that’s an issue around relapse.”

Some of the marijuana bought from dealers is contaminated with cocaine and other drugs, says Ujjainwalla, putting patients at risk of failing urine tests for drug use and being removed from the methadone program.

Photo by Errol McGihon / Postmedia

Ujjainwalla is among those working with addicts who believe cannabis can be a useful harm-reduction tool.

Activists in the cannabis community go further, often referring to marijuana as an “exit drug” and offering anecdotal evidence of people who ditched their OxyContin for weed.

As Canada struggles with a growing number of opioid overdoses, the question arises: can marijuana help addicts to reduce or quit using more harmful drugs?