Region approves supervised injection sites, Cambridge immediately bans them.

[welltoldtales]

Holy mis-information Batman.

These links have lots of background information that address many of the questions and concerns:
https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/healt...vices.aspx
https://www.regionofwaterloo.ca/en/healt...nswers.pdf

There was no funding to get cut locally; the proposed sites had not been finalized locally, had not yet been granted an exemption/operating license federally, and no funding had been allocated by the province. The exemption to open a site comes from the feds, the funding to operate the sites was expected to come from the province (although technically the funding can come from anywhere). In fact, now that the region has established need locally via the first part of their study, anyone with the financial means and a location that meets the basic criteria could take that study and apply for an SCS exemption and more than likely get it.

SCS have more wrap around services to help people access dependency treatment and counselling for substance use and access other primary health care and social services than an OPS.
SCS are more permanent and designed to help break the cycle of addiction; OPS are meant as a stop gap to prevent deaths until an SCS is up and running.

All the research comes to the same conclusions SCS:
-reduce public drug use
-reduce needle litter
-reduce spread of infectious diseases
-do not increase crime or drug activity in surrounding neighbourhoods (Vancouver has actually seen a decrease in vehicle break-ins and theft)
-are more likely to result in addiction treatment
-save taxpayers money (in the long term), and oh yeah,
they save lives.

Our community may not want to admit it, but we already have a problem locally. Doing nothing isn't going to make the problem go away. Do something different than the status quo, especially something rooted in evidence, is going to make a difference. Without SCS, needle litter will remain a problem and public and private spaces will continue to be used as injection sites, people will continue to die (Vancouver's InSite facility has never had an overdose death in 15 years with 275,000 visits annually now).

In 2017, 85 people died of opioid related drug overdoses in Waterloo Region; that's an average of 1 every 4 days and the victims come from all walks of life. For reference, the average number of fatalities on regional roads from 2012-2016 was 8.8 per year. If ~2 people a week were dying in motor vehicle crashes locally you can be the community would be mobilized and engaged at finding a solution, but the stigma around people who use drugs is holding us back from saving lives.

Using an SCS is really not that different than consuming alcohol at a bar; you use a controlled substance under professional supervision. The difference is that nobody walking down the street is going say "oh look, a new SCS opened, I think I'll try that today" - SCS do not lead to increased first-time drug use. Another difference is that a drunk is much more of a danger to others (drinking and driving, fighting, etc.) than an user of opiates.

In case you were wondering I totally agree. I am disappointed to hear the region is spending more time on consultation. I think Berry Vrbanovic spoke against some of the talk around the horseshoe coming from many of the Cambridge Councillors who basically were asking for the whole thing to get shut down. Ken Seiling put forward the motion to defer and I imagine that is partially because he didn't want to see it defeated. The reason for the deferral was to see the Provinces review, but honestly. It's because Doug Craig and Cambridge Council is saying that it shouldn't be in Galt, where it is actually needed and pushing open a site in Kitchener only would lead to the sort of stuff that people accuse SCS's of. Basically anyone who has issues would be forced to go to DTK to get help and that would over run any centre built there pretty quickly.