The Last Holdout
Walk into almost any pharmacy in Canada and you'll find shelves stocked with vitamins, prescription medications, and health products. In every province except one, you won't find cigarettes. British Columbia remains the sole outlier — the only province in the country where tobacco products can still be legally sold in drugstores, a distinction that's drawing growing criticism from health advocates.
The issue came to a head this week in the B.C. Legislature, where a testy exchange between MLAs put the spotlight back on a policy many Canadians assume was resolved long ago.
The Advocate Behind the Push
The renewed pressure comes largely from Leo Levasseur, an anti-smoking advocate from Sidney, B.C., who has been pushing for the province to fall in line with the rest of Canada. Levasseur's campaign argues that selling cigarettes in pharmacies — spaces explicitly associated with health and healing — sends a deeply contradictory message to the public, particularly to young people.
His advocacy has clearly landed. The Legislature exchange this week signalled that the issue is no longer easy for B.C. politicians to sidestep.
How Did Every Other Province Get Here?
The rest of Canada phased out tobacco sales in pharmacies through a combination of provincial legislation and voluntary pharmacy association policies adopted over the past few decades. Ontario banned the practice back in 1994. Quebec followed. Most other provinces enacted similar rules through the 1990s and 2000s, driven by concerns that selling cigarettes alongside cold medicine and baby formula undermined the credibility of health-focused retail.
Some provinces acted through legislation; others through professional regulatory bodies that govern pharmacists. The common thread was a growing consensus that pharmacies occupy a unique position in the health-care system — one that comes with responsibilities beyond what a corner store or gas station faces.
B.C. never made that move, leaving the province in an increasingly awkward position as public health awareness around tobacco has sharpened.
The Contradiction at the Counter
Health advocates argue the optics alone are damaging. Pharmacists are regulated health-care professionals. They counsel patients on quitting smoking, dispense nicotine replacement therapies, and manage medications for smoking-related illnesses. Selling cigarettes a few feet away from those products and services is, critics say, an obvious contradiction.
There's also a practical concern: convenience matters in consumer behaviour. If cigarettes are available at a location a person already visits regularly for health needs, the barrier to purchase drops — not what public health policy should be engineering.
What Comes Next
The Legislature exchange hasn't produced a firm legislative commitment yet, but the political pressure is clearly building. Advocacy groups and health organizations across B.C. are watching closely to see whether this week's debate translates into action.
For the rest of Canada, including Ottawa, the story is largely a reminder of a battle already won — but also a signal of how health policy can stall when the political will isn't quite there. B.C. has made significant strides on other public health fronts in recent years, and advocates are hoping tobacco in pharmacies is next on the list.
Source: CBC Health via CBC News
