• Each year Canadians lose approximately $24 billion ($24,000,000,000) as a result of untreated addiction. This is a loss of approximately $3000 (or nearly 3% of Canada's gross domestic product), to every Canadian family, every year as a result of unaddressed substance abuse in Canada.
• Addiction affects every socio-economic class more or less in equal proportion. Differences among income groups are not seen in rates of addiction but in the drugs of choice.
• Two thirds of Canada's economic losses from addiction are lost productivity, meaning losses to the business community (Canadian Center on Substance Abuse, 2005). Most people suffering with addictions are employed. Many family members, such as the distressed and distracted parents of teens with alcohol and drug problems, also incur costs to the economy when substance abuse and addiction are not adequately treated.
• Treatment works and is more cost effective than people usually think. It is cheaper to provide effective substance abuse and addiction treatment than it is to do nothing. Every tax dollar spent on addiction treatment has a rate of return of 5.6 to 1. The Report of the Ontario Auditor 1999 states that the Ontario economy saves $5.60 for every $1 spent on addiction treatment. Research from Europe and Australia place that figure at closer to $7 saved for every dollar spent.
• The Ontario Student Drug Use Survey (OSDUS) conducts research with Ontario's students every two years. The most recent survey, conducted in 2005, shows an increase in drug and alcohol problems reported by students in grades 7 to 12.
• The 2005 OSDUS also discovered that about 16% of Ontario students reported symptoms of drug dependence, and a similar number reported symptoms of alcohol dependence.
• In this young population the day-to-day risks of heavy alcohol and drug abuse include motor vehicle accident injury and fatalities, violence, mental health problems, unplanned and unwanted sex, unplanned pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections, damage to education and employability in the future, and a wide range of future social, economic and health problems. The impact on parents and other family members are profoundly distressing. The economic costs are huge.
• A considerable body of research in Canada, Europe, Australia, and in the USA points out that more than 70% of the prison and penitentiary populations are there because of drugs or alcohol. The average cost for incarceration of an offender in Canada is approximately $60,000 per year. In Rideauwood's Drug Treatment Court Program in Ottawa the average cost for treatment is approximately $7,000 per client per year.
• In Rideauwood's School Based Substance Abuse/Addiction Treatment Programs the average cost for treatment of students with serious alcohol and drug problems is about $800 per year.

Research from around the world and across Canada repeats the same messages year after year;