Advocacy was to save lives: Piggott

Medical officer of health Dr. Thomas Piggott said he wasn’t playing politics in his attempts earlier this year to secure money for a supervised drug consumption and treatment site (CTS) in Peterborough — he was trying to save lives.

“My advocacy for funding for the CTS were and are only motivated by one thing — saving the lives of people who use drugs in the context of the continued drug poisoning crisis affecting our community,” Piggott said via email.

The issue emerged when MPP Dave Smith — who’s running for re-election for the Progressive Conservatives on June 2 — was asked in debate on Tuesday night by Liberal candidate Greg Dempsey why it took three years of local advocacy for the CTS funding to be announced in February.

Furthermore Dempsey asked why it took Piggott approaching county council in January, “essentially begging for the money,” for the funding to be promised.

Smith responded that the process hadn’t taken three years: he said the application for funding was only received eight months prior to approval.

“Unfortunately, Dr. Piggott took it upon himself to make it a public fiasco,” Smith said. “The funding was in place, ready to be announced, prior to Dr. Piggott going to the city and to the county for it. He knew that.”

When Piggott was asked on Wednesday whether he knew the funding was about to be announced when he approached county council, he responded by saying it’s generally “not appropriate for me as a public official to engage in political debate.”

But he did say that the local board of health had asked the Ministry of Health for an update on the funding application in January — 13 months after local organizers said they’d applied — because no response was ever received.

As the board awaited news, Piggott asked county council for money to start offering the service (a council decision was deferred). He then asked the board of health as well (they voted to offer up to $250,000, as they waited for a provincial government decision). But the board of health’s funding was never required — and the city was never asked for money — after the provincial government announced $1.3 million for this year in late February.

The supervised drug consumption and treatment services are about to be added to the opioid addiction help centre in the former Greyhound station on Simcoe Street downtown.

The service hasn’t launched yet, and as of this week it was still unclear how soon it might be offered.