Heated debate erupted in the gymnasium at Dr. Margaret-Ann Armour School Saturday as residents of Edmonton-Riverbend argued over whether their suburban community would ever welcome supervised injection sites.

"It was pretty clear that a lot of people weren't supportive of safe injection sites coming into suburban areas, which we've been hearing through letters to the office and phone calls," said Matt Jeneroux, MP for Edmonton-Riverbend.

Supervised injection sites - where intravenous drug users can inject under the supervision of medical professionals as a way to reduce overdose deaths - are approved for the Royal Alexandra Hospital, the Boyle McCauley Health Centre, Boyle Street Community Services and the George Spady Society.

[continues 506 words]

It would be crazy to hold these stocks into the legalization date, because in my opinion there's just too much exuberance and too much anticipation.

Rob Armstrong, an oil camp chef living in northern Alberta, plunked $37,000 of his savings into marijuana stocks a year and a half ago. He's quadrupled his money.

Retail investors like Armstrong and larger institutional players have been getting rich from the high-stakes game of betting on the peaks and valleys of cannabis stocks.

[continues 1256 words]

Safe sites for drug users stir up heated debate at MP-led community forum in southwest Edmonton

Heated debate erupted in the gymnasium at Dr. Margaret-Ann Armour School Saturday as residents of Edmonton-Riverbend argued over whether their suburban community would ever welcome supervised injection sites.

"It was pretty clear that a lot of people weren't supportive of safe injection sites coming into suburban areas, which we've been hearing through letters to the office and phone calls," said Matt Jeneroux, member of parliament for Edmonton-Riverbend.

[continues 550 words]

The Alberta Party says a network of publicly owned cannabis stores will cost at least $168 million, a price it says is too steep to pay when the private sector is lined up to serve the market when recreational marijuana is legalized next year.

The NDP government has mandated that legal weed be sold in stand-alone stores but has not yet decided whether to set up government-owned and operated stores or allow private retailers.

In a news release Monday, Alberta Party Leader Greg Clark pegged the cost of a public system at $168.4 million.

[continues 383 words]

The evidence points to an urgent need, say Elaine Hyshka and Cameron Wild.

Last week, Health Canada issued the approvals to establish supervised consumption services in Edmonton. Scientific evidence consistently supports the individual and community benefits of these services, and local data demonstrate an urgent need for them in our inner city.

Unfortunately, some people allege ("Safe injection sites will hurt vulnerable communities," Oct. 21) the scientific evidence used to support Health Canada's decision is biased and not credible. We write to correct this misrepresentation of facts.

[continues 582 words]

Safe injection sites only serve to delay the inevitable downward spiral of life for addicts.

In the meantime, larger and larger areas of downtown become even more unlivable as the number of addicts rises. This leads to more robberies, assaults, murders as addicts commit crimes to support their lifestyles and dealers fight for market share and territory. We only have a couple of options: One is to supply addicts with drugs and supplies under condition they don't commit any crimes. Since they're addicts, they'd be under our control. A total enablement and surrender if there ever was one.

Or, more realistically, as a society we need to make some fundamental changes toward drug treatment. Make detox more available and, once voluntarily entered, a person cannot leave until the program is complete.

P.M. Zupan, Edmonton

[end]

Did anyone expect the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees to decide the sale of legal marijuana is best put in the hands of private enterprise? Delegates to the union's convention in Edmonton on the weekend passed a resolution that - gasp - "all cannabis retail outlets be publicly owned and operated by the Government of Alberta or one of its regulated agencies."

Union members - or more precisely, their executive and the employees they hire - rely on dues to keep the lights on at the AUPE office. The addition of a few thousand card-carrying marijuana retail workers would add a shine to the AUPE's ledgers.

[continues 330 words]

Alberta health officials are handing out between 2,000 and 3,000 naloxone kits a month to combat a lethal fentanyl epidemic.

In two years of providing at least 30,972 of the free kits that include the anti-narcotic formula, Naloxone has reversed a reported 2,330 overdoses in the province, said Dr. Nick Etches, medical officer of health for the Calgary region.

"Certainly, there have been more reversals than reported, the majority of times people are not telling us," he said, also noting those numbers are as of Sept. 30, and don't include naloxone interventions delivered by medical professionals.

[continues 468 words]

The Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) has adopted a resolution supporting the public sale of marijuana when the drug becomes legal next year.

The federal government plans to legalize marijuana by July 1, 2018, but has left many of the details - including how the drug will be sold - - up to the provinces.

On the last day of its annual convention Saturday, members of the AUPE, Alberta's largest labour organization, endorsed a resolution that "all cannabis retail outlets be publicly owned and operated by the Government of Alberta or one of its regulated agencies."

[continues 358 words]

Supervised drug consumption site set to open Jan. 2

What's old will be renewed again in a bid to save lives from the rising number of drug overdoses in Lethbridge. Government officials and local media received a tour Friday of the city's future supervised consumption site, currently under construction.

The former Pulse nightclub is being transformed into what will become a "clean and safe space" area for drug users to snort, inhale, inject or swallow drugs while under the supervision of healthcare professionals and without fear of arrest.

[continues 1061 words]

My hope is that the supervised injection sites recently approved at four locations in Edmonton will become a jumping-off point for heroin-assisted treatment (HAT) in our province.

In my opinion, it is the only way to tackle the opioid scourge that is leaving a trail of bodies in its wake. Countries like Switzerland have experienced rates of homelessness and property crime associated with problematic drug use approaching zero per cent after approving the use of HAT by qualified doctors.

This approach is counter-intuitive to many, but the numbers speak for themselves. The health authority in the United Kingdom figures that for every dollar spent on harm reduction, it saves $3 in health services and enforcement.

Steven Zerebeski, Beaumont

[end]

Vancouver's experience isn't very encouraging, writes Warren Champion.

The news tells us the epicentre of opioid/fentanyl deaths appears to be situated in the urban core of Edmonton, specifically, in the communities of Central McDougall and McCauley.

The three levels of government created an organization named AMSISE - Access to Medically Supervised Injection Services. AMSISE applied to the federal government on May 1 for a waiver that would allow approved sites to provide supervised injection services.

The rationale given was "the spike in opioid-related overdose deaths has pushed the need for an effective set of responses into the forefront for community and government."

[continues 618 words]

Remand Centre hopes technology cuts in-custody overdoses, boosts staff safety

Edmonton Remand Centre inmates will go through an electronic body scanner to counter the smuggling of increasingly toxic drugs and other contraband into the lockup.

The scanner, similar to those used by airport security, takes a full body X-ray. The remand centre, which showed off the new equipment Wednesday, is the first correctional facility in Alberta to test the technology.

New inmates, transferred inmates and inmates suspected of having contraband will be put through the scanner, said Ken Johnston, security director of the remand centre, which houses about 1,500 people in custody awaiting trial.

[continues 314 words]

Supporters of Edmonton's Chinatown and urban community league members say they 're disappointed with the Ottawa's approval of four supervised drug consumption sites in the city's core.

"We feel that it's an extremely unfair decision, and not well-informed," Michael Lee, chairman of the Chinese Benevolent Association, said Wednesday.

"The basic rights of some communities (were) totally ignored."

Alberta Health announced Wednesday that its federal counterpart had approved three supervised injection sites in Edmonton's downtown core and supervised consumption services for inpatients at the Royal Alexandra Hospital.

[continues 276 words]

Alberta's first supervised drug injection sites will open within months at four locations in Edmonton's inner city after receiving approval from Health Canada, the provincial government announced Wednesday.

Proponents hailed the news as a "long overdue" step that will save lives and direct more addicts into treatment.

The goal is to get three community sites open by late December or early January, while a fourth facility at the Royal Alexandra Hospital is anticipated to open sometime in the spring of 2018.

[continues 1235 words]

Health Canada approved the first few supervised consumption facilities in Alberta on Wednesday, including a site in downtown Lethbridge.

ARCHES and Edmonton-based coalition AMSISE received an exemption from federal drug legislation, allowing them to operate supervised consumption sites.

Four sites are slated to open, three in Edmonton and one in Lethbridge, which will operate out of the former night club Pulse.

The application process for Lethbridge moved quicker than most and Jill Manning, the managing director of ARCHES, feels that may be a result of the unique issues Lethbridge is facing around substance use.

[continues 571 words]

By next summer, a brave new world will dawn on Edmonton streets. Smokers will openly, and quite legally under certain restrictions, puff on joints purchased from a cannabis store selling a line of products sanctioned by and maybe even distributed by a provincial agency. If the Notley government decides to adopt a public retailing system instead of a private model, the province itself may adopt the role of pot dealer - a scenario that a few scant years ago would have rightly elicited a "what-have-you-been-smoking?" response in a region traditionally known for small-c conservative values.

[continues 344 words]

It is great to see Edmonton embracing supervised injection sites. The number of people dying from fentanyl (thousands per year) would be alarming but for the general indifference our governments have for drug users.

The war on drugs directly causes fentanyl deaths; people trying to use cocaine inadvertently use fentanyl, then overdose.

The war on drugs directly supports organized crime.

If all drugs were legal and regulated, cartels would not exist: they are the only group that benefits from this policy.

[continues 74 words]

I was disturbed by the language of Shelly Williams when talking about safe injection sites. "This is for people who are injecting substances in unsafe environments, and providing them the opportunity to inject in a safe place where we can deepen relationships." She leaves out that the substances are illegal, and it has a $2.3 M annual cost. Food bank demand is surging, kids are going to school hungry and our government is coddling drug addicts?

Jason Morton



(The goal is to defray costs to the healthcare system and prevent deaths.)

[end]

It doesn't make sense to invest (public) money to set up infrastructure here.

Premier Rachel Notley won't say which way her NDP government is leaning when it comes to sales of legal cannabis, but she insists the province is carefully weighing the merits of both the public and private sector options.

Under its policy framework unveiled last week, the NDP will allow recreational marijuanato be sold only in stand-alone stores once it is legalized next year, but the government is still weighing whether to set up a system of government owned and operated stores, or leave retail to the private sector.

[continues 478 words]