Businesses want no part of injection site
An overdose prevention site in Vernon should be located at the hospital, not downtown, the city’s chamber of commerce says.
Putting the facility in the central core would negatively impact businesses already struggling with the financial effects of COVID-19, chamber leaders say.
“We have heard concerns that customers, and particularly seniors and families, are worried about their safety given the long-standing issues of drug use, loitering, and verbal abuse in the area,” chamber president Krystin Kempton said in a Wednesday release.
The chamber says it’s not opposed to the drug overdose prevention site in principle, only its proposed location.
Vernon Jubilee Hospital is within walking distance of the downtown, has good access to public transit, and “provides a level of anonymity” for people who use drugs in private, the chamber says.
Interior Health announced in early May that it would expand its existing urgent and primary care centre at 3306A 32nd Ave. to accommodate an overdose prevention facility.
“Supervised consumption services and overdose prevention sites are evidence-based health services that provide a safe and hygienic environment where people can inject or consume pre-obtained prescribed or illicit drugs,” IH says on its website.
“These sites will offer a place where people who use drugs can be safely monitored and treated if they overdose,” the Interior Health Authority says.
Supervised consumption sites already operate in Kelowna and Kamloops.
Interior Health says that, since May 2017, 145 overdoses have been “managed” at the facilities, with no fatalities.
The downtown Vernon site was selected, IH says, after a long period of public consultation and a review of epidemiological information.