Pubdate: Thu, 27 Mar 2003
Source: NOW Magazine (Canada)
Copyright: 2003 NOW Communications Inc.
Contact:  http://www.nowtoronto.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/282
Author: Rene Biberstein
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?142 (Safe Injecting Rooms)

NO SAFE PLACE TO SHOOT

City Balks At Injection Sites Despite Feds' OK

Political will around these parts shifts at roughly the speed of sludge in 
the Don River. Slower when it comes to the issue of drugs and harm 
reduction.Still, when the feds let it be known last fall that they were 
open to cities setting up their own safe injection sites for addicts, it 
was hoped that there would be more than a few takers. So far, only 
Vancouver is known to have signed on to the pilot project.

Local advocates of supervised drug injection, like the Toronto Harm 
Reduction Task Force, say the need is just as great here, where the 
estimate of 18,000 addicts rivals the number in Canada's drug capital.

A study by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health showed that 10 per 
cent of Toronto's heroin addicts are HIV-positive. Problems are especially 
serious when it comes to homeless drug addicts.

According to the mayor's task force on homelessness, 50 per cent of street 
drug users surveyed tested positive for hepatitis C. These numbers are so 
alarming that the city's public health department, which currently 
administers needle exchange programs, supported the idea of safe injection 
sites in principle a few years ago.

"It's something we support as a concept," says Shaun Hopkins, manager of 
The Works. Hopkins says informal groundwork, including surveying addicts 
and getting legal advice on how the sites could be administered, is already 
being done.

Valerie Cartledge, an adviser to the Toronto Harm Reduction Task Force, 
says supervised sites could attract addicts to other assistance programs.

"I think you'd see a drop in hospital use. You'd see a drop in ODs. You'd 
see people connecting," she says.

The clinics would be small and located in existing outreach centres. 
Clients would go through a registration process, and their names would be 
kept confidential from the police. No one would be allowed to sell drugs on 
the premises.

Health Canada has signalled that the government would be willing to exempt 
staff and clients from anti-drug laws. People have talked about safe 
injection sites for years. They have long been reality in Amsterdam, 
Frankfurt, Zurich and other European cities. Barbara Hall floated the idea 
when she was mayor.

But more than a decade later, "There's no solid movement at City Hall to 
get it to happen," laments Cartledge.

Indeed, city council seems unlikely to touch the issue soon. Even lefty 
councillors behind the idea in principle offer only lukewarm support.

"I believe in harm reduction," says mayoral hopeful David Miller cautiously.

"If there's a need, we should do it," adds councillor Olivia Chow. "The 
research seems to say it's good."

So why isn't anything happening? "It's too hot an issue for council to 
handle," thinks councillor Chris Korwin-Kuczynski, an opponent of the 
supervised-injection approach.

A pilot project could happen if Toronto's public health department 
determines that addicts would use it and if city council approves it. But 
it would also need financial backing, and the provincial government is 
reluctant to chip in.

Last fall, Health Minister Tony Clement spoke out vehemently against the 
idea, insisting that it would never happen in his province. That would 
leave the ever cash-strapped city to pay for the whole project.

"The focus here is how do you stop people from this altogether," says John 
Letherby, a spokesperson for the provincial ministry.

Letherby insists that supervised drug injection sites don't work and that 
the only way to fight the effects of drugs is to keep educating children 
about them. "It's better to put in funding for prevention," he says.

Toronto police are also far from comfortable with the idea. While police 
don't make decisions on things like supervised drug sites, they would need 
to agree not to arrest addicts and medical staff at the clinics. According 
to Constable Shehara Valles, police are skeptical that supervised injection 
sites reduce crime and drug use -- even while they have come to support 
methadone clinics and needle exchanges.

Raffi Balian, an ex-heroin user now on methadone and the coordinator of 
COUNTERfit, a program that works to get drug addicts off the streets, says 
safe injection sites are inevitable.

"Not because there's any love for illicit drug use, but because it's 
necessary," he says. With mounting health care costs associated with 
addiction, Balian thinks the city soon won't be able to afford not to build 
the sites.

Politically, though, the idea of helping to reduce the spread of disease 
and the number of overdoses and to keep drug users alive long enough to get 
clean still has some way to go.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom