Item 1: Just last month, Jane Philpott, the health minister, made clear the government believes there is a “moral imperative” to combat substance abuse.Given Canada's unofficial status as the world's largest user of opioids, with an estimated 410,000 people abusing prescription drugs, it is inexplicable why her department has decided not to act on regulations proposed last year to make controlled release oxycodone drugs tamper-resistant.When Rona Ambrose was health minister she proposed to reverse the decision taken by her predecessor to allow generic drugmakers to produce their own version of the powerful painkiller, OxyContin. This would have brought Canada in line with Food and Drug Administration rules in the U.S., where overdoses dropped significantly.Further, it would have pleased U.S. lawmakers, who have lobbied the Canadian government about the amount of non-abuse deterrent formulations of pain-killers seeping across the border.Purdue Pharma's OxyNEO, which r