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At a Tim Hortons in Newmarket, Ontario, what should have been a quick stop turned into something more revealing.

Before the commentary begins – no, this wasn’t a coffee run but rather a brief visit to the restroom. It was supposed to be in and out, but walking into the restroom felt oddly disorienting.

The entire washroom was illuminated in a deep blue hue, which gave more nightclub than coffee shop vibes.

At first glance, it seemed a practical explanation would be enhanced sanitation lighting. A method to better detect and clean bodily fluids in a high-traffic public space, perhaps?

That assumption didn’t hold for long.

After asking an employee about the lighting, the explanation was equal parts shocking and understandable: the blue lights are installed to deter intravenous drug use. The tint makes veins harder to see, and according to one staff member, it has resulted in fewer overdoses occurring inside the restroom itself.

While it may come as a surprise to some, this isn’t a new or isolated approach. Variations of blue lighting have reportedly been used in parts of British Columbia for years—introduced as a response to escalating public drug use and overdose incidents following the introduction of government-sanctioned ‘safer’ supply of deadly, highly addictive opioids.

Over the past decade, the Liberal government has invested over a billion dollars into this strategy, under the guise of ‘harm reduction.’

This includes safe supply initiatives, decriminalization of illicit drugs, and public health campaigns aimed at mitigating overdose deaths – and the cost has been astronomical, both in dollars and human lives.

With rising overdose rates, increased visibility of public drug use, and a growing strain on communities and businesses, these measures do little to counteract addiction but rather serve to enable it.

What’s clear is that businesses are left to adapt in real time.

When a fast-food restaurant installs specialized lighting to discourage drug use in its washrooms, it reflects a societal shift. Public spaces, once taken for granted, now require precautionary design. The goal is no longer just cleanliness or convenience, but prevention of medical emergencies on-site.

It leaves one to wonder: If harm reduction is the primary framework, where does recovery fit? Where are the investments in treatment, long-term rehabilitation, and reintegration?

No one wants to see people dying. Not in public spaces, private homes, restaurant bathrooms, or otherwise, but blue lights aren't compassion.

Real compassion looks a lot more like tough love, like recovery programs that actually work – from treatment and detox beds, to policies that discourage use instead of handing out the tools to keep using.

Take Public Health’s funding of “Safer Booty Bumping For Guys Who Like to Party,” for instance. Equipped with a catchy infographic, these kits come complete with step-by-step instructions on how to dissolve drugs in water, lube up, and shove them up your behind “safely” so you can party harder without too much rectal damage.

Nothing quite says “harm reduction” like taxpayer dollars going to teach grown men how to anally insert meth and fentanyl more efficiently.

This is the same ideology that turned public bathrooms into blue-lit no-go zones.

So while public health says blue lights “stigmatize” drug users, maybe it’s worth bringing back a little of that stigma and reinstating the 1980’s campaign that your brain on drugs looks a lot like a scrambled egg.