Safe drug use sites a way station to hell or the future?
Moral dilemmas, NIMBY-ism and budgets pose obstacles
Coun. Donna Skelly was curious what safe injection places for drug addicts look like.
So Dr. Jessica Hopkins, Hamilton associate medical officer of health, drew her attention to slides of the Insite facility in Vancouver, one of two legally operating injection sites in Canada, both in Gastown.
It has subdued lighting and shiny floors.
It has mirrored booths where junkies can shoot up with heroin or any other illegal drugs they get their shaky hands on.
And it has a steel countertop divided into alcoves where trained staff provide “clients” with free clean needles, syringes, tourniquets, alcohol swabs, cookers, spoons, filters and sterile water.
To me it all looked like a way station to hell designed by a soulless technocrat.
But it could be the future for this city depending on council’s appetite for controversial projects.
The board of health, which all members of council sit on, took a tiny tentative step in that direction earlier this week by approving the public health department’s request to survey how the community feels about so-called supervised or safe injection sites.
The second shoe will land during the 2017 budget debate when councillors consider a request for $250,000 for a feasibility study — which could be offset by senior government grants — for opening one or more sites here.
Coun. Lloyd Ferguson cast the only dissenting vote on “moral” grounds. He fears making shootup sites available to addicts is tantamount to condoning their behaviour and turning a blind eye to breaking the law.
Ferguson may have been the lone objector but there’s no question he put his finger on the ethical dilemma the issue raises.
But it’s a quandary precisely because there are compelling arguments on the other side.
As Hopkins explained, the goal of injection sites is harm reduction to individual addicts and the community.
For addicts, the sites, among other things, have been shown to reduce overdoses and the spread of infectious diseases through shared needles.
For the community, it reduces the dangers of discarded needles and the social nuisance of addicts shooting up in public places.
As Coun. Matthew Green pointed out, there are already unofficial injection sites across the city. Discarded needles are routinely found in alleys, on trails, and by railroad tracks. A city-sanctioned site is a proactive way of dealing with the problem, he says.
In other words, an injection site doesn’t condone drug addiction, it tries to contain it.
According to Hopkins, though the city would provide paraphernalia and a safe place, users would have to bring their own “pre-obtained drugs.” She noted the federal minister of health provides exemptions to both addicts and staff at injection sites so they can’t be arrested for drug possession or trafficking while there. What are the negatives? Skelly asked. There are “no significant negatives,” Hopkins replied.
Ferguson, of course, disagrees. No doubt so will neighbourhoods facing the prospect of playing host to one.
Hopkins says a site would likely be located where drug injections are most prevalent.
Skelly presumed that means the urban core. Nobody contradicted her.
Downtown councillor Jason Farr predicts an injection site is sure to run into NIMBY-ism — not in my backyard.
Yes, but it’s also bound to run into budgetary obstacles.
Hopkins estimates capital costs for an injection site would be about $1 million to $1.5 million.
Annual operating costs could be several hundred thousand dollars.
Unless council demonstrates an unusually determined progressive streak, the combination of moral dilemmas, NIMBY-ism and project costs will likely keep pushing this idea down the road.
On the other hand, perhaps there are creative options to be explored.
Perhaps an injection site could be located at the downtown David Braley Health Sciences Centre, for instance. After all, the city contributed $20 million to the centre and that’s where public health, which is advocating the idea, is headquartered.
And to help out, perhaps inner city councillors could all tap their area rating slush funds to finance a social infrastructure project which, to be blunt, has their wards written all over it.