Safe injection site in Medicine Hat still in early stages of fruition

The local HIV Community Link is still in the preliminary stage of its effort to bring a safe injection site to Medicine Hat, according to the group’s communications specialist Ana Glavan.

In May, the group’s executive director Leslie Hill told the News it was in the midst of creating a survey for drug users to gauge the need for a supervised injection site in town.

Hill said this move was a “response to the rise in opioid use across the province.”

Tim Kulak, Alberta Health’s assistant communications director, said the province supports bringing supervised injection sites to communities where they’re needed.

“These services are shown to reduce overdose deaths and help people connect to other health and social supports,” he said.

The ultimate decision rests with the federal government but Alberta Health is helping fund local communities’ needs assessments, like the one underway in Medicine Hat, and applications, Kulak added.

There are four Albertan applications for safe consumption sites in Edmonton, Calgary and Lethbridge.

According to an Alberta Health report on opioid deaths in the province, 83 per cent of drug overdose deaths in 2016 were the direct result of opioids, including the powerful synthetic fentanyl.

Between April and June 2017, 81 per cent of Alberta’s fentanyl-related deaths occurred in large municipalities — Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, Lethbridge, Grande Prairie and Fort McMurray — although none have occurred this year in Medicine Hat.

In 2016, there were four fentanyl-related deaths in Medicine Hat, or a rate of 5.8 per 100,000 people, compared to 10 in Lethbridge, or 10.3 per 100,000, and 155 in Calgary, or a rate of 11.7.

There have been no overdoses this year from an opioid other than fentanyl in Alberta’s south zone, which includes Medicine Hat.