Sanguen Health Centre seeks temporary overdose prevention site
WATERLOO REGION — Explaining the urgent need to create safe places for people to use drugs in Waterloo Region is simple for Dr. Chris Steingart.
“People are dying and we have to do something,” said Steingart, head of Sanguen Health Centre.
Sanguen, which focuses on hepatitis C treatment and prevention with offices in Waterloo and Guelph, is looking across the region for a spot to open a temporary overdose prevention site.
“This is part of the solution,” Steingart said.
The region is pursuing the possibility of opening up to three permanent supervised injection sites.
At a special meeting on Tuesday, council endorsed moving into the second phase to identify potential locations and models.
That follows a feasibility study and public input at two recent meetings.
More consultation will be needed from community partners to narrow down locations, and then directly with people who live, work or go to school near the proposed sites.
“That’s a drawn-out process,” Steingart said.
“In the meantime, we’re starting to get a bit frantic.”
There were 71 suspected overdose deaths in Waterloo Region last year, compared to 38 opioid-related deaths in 2016.
“The reality is that when people are dying, there needs to be a response to that. There needs to be a recognition that this is an ongoing crisis that’s not going to change until we bring these measures into the community,” Steingart said.
Sanguen plans to put in an application to the province the same day it finds a suitable spot. The province has promised a two-week approval process, Steingart said, and Sanguen would get the site up and running as soon as possible.
“Ideally, I’d like to see the temporary site turn into the permanent sites.”
The temporary sites offer a place for people to use drugs under the watch of health-care professionals. Permanent sites include other wraparound services mandated by the province, and the region plans to also offer basic health care and access to treatment.
Sanguen said it is looking for a place that reaches people who are at risk, but also takes into consideration the community’s needs and concerns.
“We want to do something as soon as we can, but in the right way,” Steingart said.
The risk of delay or inaction is that more people are put in danger of overdose, and unsanctioned sites could pop up.
That’s the case in Toronto’s Moss Park, an illegal overdose prevention site that has been operating since August. It started out in a tent and then moved into a heated trailer at the start of the winter, with tacit approval of police and city officials.
Regional Chair Ken Seiling said he’s heard concerns that temporary operations might set up in the region. That was also brought up by several councillors at a meeting Tuesday to discuss the region’s next step for supervised injection sites.
Cambridge Mayor Doug Craig asked about temporary sites.
And Karen Quigley-Hobbs, the region’s director of infectious disease, explained that an organization can apply directly to the province to open one. The province would notify the municipality, she said, but it does not require municipal approval.
“So, essentially, it circumvents everything we’re doing here,” Craig said.
Kitchener Mayor Berry Vrbanovic said once unsanctioned pop-up sites appear, it becomes a political issue about how to deal with it.
Chief administrative officer Mike Murray cautioned councillors to keep in mind “that is a possibility.” The Moss Park site is not sanctioned, he said, “but it’s serving an important need and I think people recognize it’s saving lives.”
That could happen in this region, Vrbanovic said, “and we’d be faced with the same dilemma.”
Seiling said Sanguen’s plan might be a “good interim step” while the region continues pursuing permanent sites.
Steingart is keen to create a place for people to take drugs more safely, and likely that will alleviate the problems the region is currently experiencing related to public drug use and discarded needles.
“We can’t keep going the way things are now,” he said.