Study backs multiple drug consumption rooms for city
study looking at opening a consumption room for illegal drugs in Edinburgh has backed establishing a number of centres in city drug ‘hotspots’ to reduce the rate of fatal overdoses.
Research concluded that providing users with a safer drug consumption facility (SDCF) could help to mitigate “significant levels of drug-related harm” across the Capital.
However further legal advice would need to be obtained in advance of any service being launched to ensure its procedures “remain lawful”.
With “dispersed patterns” of harm across the city it was recommended to take steps to provide consumption rooms – also called overdose prevention centres – in hotspot areas. These were identified as being the Old Town, parts of Leith, Granton, Niddrie, Wester Hailes, Gorgie, Dalry and Fountainbridge.
Setting up such a service in Edinburgh could cost between £1 million and £2m a year, according to a “broad estimate” by the researchers, who said evidence showed SDCFs can ultimately result in “overall savings” across health services.
The council and Edinburgh Alcohol and Drugs PartnerA ship (EADP) commissioned a team at Stirling University to undertake the feasibility study in response to the rise in drugrelated deaths which have doubled in the Capital over the last decade, hitting a record 113 in 2022.
The work could pave the way for a trial scheme, likely in the city centre, following approval of a pilot consumption room in Glasgow expected to open later this year.
Meanwhile the Scottish Government has said it would not look to prosecute users of proposed SDFCs for possession of illegal substances.
A report on the findings, published last week at the request of councillors, said rates of drug-related harm across the Lothian region “have consistently been above the national average”.
It said patterns of drug use are “varied and dynamic” in Edinburgh, noting a recent “rapid increase” in people injecting cocaine and taking ‘street benzos’ – while injected heroin use “remains a very significant concern and source of considerable harm”.
It added: “Edinburgh – alongside the rest of the UK – faces the prospect of increased levels of synthetic opioids in the drug supply chain… SDCF provision would clearly provide a key opportunity for harm reduction in this context.”