Pubdate: Tue, 05 Apr 2016
Source: Edmonton Journal (CN AB)
Copyright: 2016 The Edmonton Journal
Contact: 
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/opinion/letters/letters-to-the-editor.html
Website: http://www.edmontonjournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/134
Author: Paula Simons
Page: A4

WE NEED A DISCUSSION ON SAFE INJECTION SITES

A new Mainstreet/Postmedia poll says 44 per cent of Edmontonians 
surveyed support the establishment of a safe injection site for IV 
drug users in this city.

Another 30 per cent opposed the idea, while 26 per cent were undecided.

That's not overwhelming public support. But it suggests an intriguing 
degree of public receptiveness. And this is the right time for us to 
be having that discussion.

Historically, heroin hasn't been a problem drug in Edmonton. But 
that's changing. In 2013, there were 19 visits to emergency rooms in 
the Edmonton health zone because of heroin overdoses. Last year, 
there were 118. In the first two months of 2016, there were about as 
many heroin overdoses as there were in all of 2013.

Intravenous drugs users in Edmonton are also injecting other drugs, 
everything from morphine to cocaine to methamphetamine to fentanyl.

Supervised injection sites aren't a new idea.

Vancouver, which has a more serious heroin problem, has been running 
its InSite clinic for more than a decade. Other countries, including 
Spain, Australia, Switzerland, Germany and the Netherlands, have been 
running "consumption rooms" for decades. Switzerland opened its first 
state-sanctioned safe injection room in 1988. Germany followed in 1994.

But for Edmonton, this is still a relatively fresh idea. For months 
now, a group called Access to Medically Supervised Injection Services 
Edmonton has been meeting to figure out just how a safe site here might work.

The Trudeau government has already indicated it is far more open to 
safe injection sites than the Harper government. But the issue really 
hit the public agenda when Mayor Don Iveson discussed it last month. 
So far, the Edmonton Police Service has been mum about its views on a 
supervised injection site. Chief Rod Knecht will address the issue this Friday.

There is something uncomfortable about a state-sponsored space 
especially designed to help desperate people to inject themselves 
with dangerous illegal drugs. Their clients are primarily poor or 
homeless. Enabling their continued drug use, instead of helping them 
to find safe housing and mental health-care, seems counter-intuitive. 
But does it work? European studies suggest consumption rooms have 
little or no impact on the amount of drugs clients use. Safe 
injection facilities didn't increase or decrease drug use.

Similarly, crime statistics from six countries generally show that 
thefts and property crimes in the areas where these clinics existed 
didn't go up or down.

Data from four German cities did find a statistically significant 
decrease in deaths due to overdoses. But the most compelling evidence 
of the value of safe injection sites is they improve the general 
health of their clients.

For many homeless addicts, the injection sites were their best and 
only link to public health care. Because they felt safe and welcome, 
they would go to the nurses and counsellors for all kinds of medical 
and personal help.

Marliss Taylor is a member of the board of Alberta Health Services, a 
registered nurse, and executive director of Streetworks. The program 
works with addicts on the street, providing services such a needle 
exchange, which will hand out 1.6 million needles this year. For 
Taylor, the case for a supervised injection site in Edmonton is clear.

"There are people already injecting in your back alley and in your 
neighbourhood. This is a way to move it indoors, where it can be 
safely monitored. Some people will say that we're enabling and 
encouraging. But the question to ask is, 'How can we help people and 
communities to be safer and healthier?' And what we're doing right 
now is exactly the opposite."

Supervised injection sites are no panacea for a medical and social 
crisis. We need more addiction treatment beds, better mental 
health-care services, more supportive housing. We need early 
intervention programs that stop people from spiralling into serious 
addiction in the first place. Just creating safe, clean places to 
shoot up doesn't address the root causes of drug abuse.

But leaving people to shoot-up or die on the street is no answer. 
Edmonton's problems aren't on the scale of Vancouver's. But if a safe 
injection site might reduce overdose deaths and hospital admissions, 
might reduce the spread of HIV and hepatitis C, might help vulnerable 
people access general health care, maybe it's worth trying here.

It will need lots of community debate and consultation. But now is 
the time to start the conversation.
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