3800 replies to this topic

[LJ]

Support beds, as in helping to get people clean? If so, I can get behind that.

Perhaps they should have started with support beds and addiction reduction services in the first place then there wouldn't have been such a need for them now.

 

They didn't achieve the great reduction in cigarette smoking by giving you more places to smoke, cheaper cigarettes, no enforcement of no smoking rules, and normalizing smoking. It's not going to work to do all that with drugs.

[Nparker]

...They didn't achieve the great reduction in cigarette smoking by giving you more places to smoke, cheaper cigarettes, no enforcement of no smoking rules, and normalizing smoking...

This is what I have been saying for years. In order to reduce the health issues brought on by tobacco, a concerted effort was made to stigmatize smoking and cigarettes. For some reason it is believed that taking the opposite position will somehow reduce the damage done by illicit and highly addictive drugs. I have trouble understanding how such contrasting tactics are meant to achieve the same result.

[Love the rock]

Two things that would help in my opinion.
First The big one Changes in the mental health act .
Second You don’t hold AA meeting in bars or send people with gambling addictions into casinos to over come there addiction .So why are we sending addicts to safe injection sites with illegal drugs to od over and over just to revive them .
Why do we think it’s ok to allow people to become the walking dead and then expect them to function rational after they’ve fried what’s left of their brains cells .They're allowed to wonder
streets unable to function safely for themselves and other .
Are we the stupid ones
Start looking at the issues different what we’ve being doing does work .
Force the government to look at changes in the mental health act bring in emergency efforts if that’s what needed to start with .

Edited by Love the rock, 09 September 2019 - 10:50 PM.

[DustMagnet]

Second You don’t hold AA meeting in bars or send people with gambling addictions into casinos to over come there addiction .So why are we sending addicts to safe injection sites with illegal drugs to od over and over just to revive them .

 

Just to add some nuance to this point: the safe injection sites are to handle OD/reaction issues because the drugs are unregulated and wildly variable.  They are harm reduction not rehab and thus can't be compared to AA or GA meetings.

 

If a random bottle of booze could kill you (Dominican Republic?), then they wouldn't want you drinking at home either.

[Sparky]

^ Yes but you don’t have to be a Mensa genius to know that you can’t recover from lung cancer by sleeping in a coal mine.

[Love the rock]

Just to add some nuance to this point: the safe injection sites are to handle OD/reaction issues because the drugs are unregulated and wildly variable.  They are harm reduction not rehab and thus can't be compared to AA or GA meetings.
 
If a random bottle of booze could kill you (Dominican Republic?), then they wouldn't want you drinking at home either.

Harm reduction hmm .. How does shooting unknown drugs into your rapidly declining body over and over again ..reduce harm .
Idioms, pretty ugly harm reductions .

[Love the rock]

I guess what I’m saying is what we’re doing isn’t working for anyone.
The addicts ,the first responders, the general population ,the families left to pick up the pieces ...the dead .
Maybe we should brain storm and be open to changing our tactics .

[Victoria Watcher]

I’m all for government supplied narcotics. but not free. if they are free we’ll entice more users. there is almost no doubt about that.

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 11 September 2019 - 01:54 AM.

[rmpeers]

I'm all for anything that gets people clean. Heartbreaking seeing so many people downtown clearly under the spell of addiction. At what point will somebody with some power have the guts to admit the status quo is not working. Not saying there's an easy answer, but how long can you keep doing the same thing before you admit it's a colossal failure? When Pandora fully turns into East Hastings?

[Nparker]

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result...

- attributed to Alfred Einstein, but more likely originating in one of the twelve-step communities

[DustMagnet]

^ Yes but you don’t have to be a Mensa genius to know that you can’t recover from lung cancer by sleeping in a coal mine.

 

Harm reduction hmm .. How does shooting unknown drugs into your rapidly declining body over and over again ..reduce harm .
Idioms, pretty ugly harm reductions .

 

You have to narrow your focus.  The safe injection site harm reduction is specifically to prevent or treat accidental overdoses or poisonings from unregulated street drugs.  That's it.  That's all.  That's the specific harm (overdose/death) that it's reducing.

 

Getting rid of the drugs, getting rid of the dealers, getting people off the drugs, addressing social/mental issues before people turn to drugs, all these things are so important and also not the purpose of the safe injection site.

 

I suppose some people think that safe injection sites are enabling addicts, but addicts are going to use anyway so not having the sites isn't preventing anything.  (There are some people who do see a lack of intervention in drug deaths as a self-solving problem, but I don't think that's what's being advocated here.)

[Victoria Watcher]

Getting rid of the drugs, getting rid of the dealers, getting people off the drugs, addressing social/mental issues before people turn to drugs, all these things are so important and also not the purpose of the safe injection site.

.)

we are told time and time again though that the secondary purpose of the site is to connect users with services like addiction counselling or detox though. even if there is little or no evidence this actually happens.

[rmpeers]

we are told time and time again though that the secondary purpose of the site is to connect users with services like addiction counselling or detox though. even if there is little or no evidence this actually happens.

Although there was once an allegation that a staffer one of the sites was recommending a particular dealer, I recall.

[DustMagnet]

we are told time and time again though that the secondary purpose of the site is to connect users with services like addiction counselling or detox though. even if there is little or no evidence this actually happens.

 

Sounds like a nice-to-have, even if there isn't available evidence as to its efficacy.  No bearing on the primary purpose though.

 

There's actually another value of the safe injection site - it's a source of clean needles (to prevent spreading of infectious disease) and a method of keeping said needles from entering the environment.

 

Although there was once an allegation that a staffer one of the sites was recommending a particular dealer, I recall.

"Interesting if true."  I can imagine that happening if they had a reputation for cleaner drugs.

 

Still doesn't change the primary (to clarify) purpose of the sites: stop OD/poisoning deaths.

[Victoria Watcher]

haven’t we heard only a tiny percentage of users use the sites? does that mean we need more? or the ones we have are of little use? why don’t we let every doctors waiting room or every rec centre or school equipped with naxalone kits serve as safe injection places too?

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 11 September 2019 - 10:01 AM.

[Love the rock]

All I’m saying is we need to re-evaluate what we’re doing.More and more people are turning to drugs .If we’re being honest with ourselves having someone overdose over and over again killing off brain cells just to be brought back to life and do it again isn’t reducing harm .
Please don’t misunderstand me .Im not for people using dirty needles and water from puddles behind a building and dying. If you are an elderly person ,you have a fall and end up in hospital more than once . Several qualified people determine you are not able to live on your own . You want your independents for your own safety you are placed in a home . Why is this different . Tell me how we change the laws so the law is only used and not abused for treatment for serious drug addiction .We’ve changed the laws regarding assisted death can we not figure out a treatment for addicts .
Maybe have treatment look so much better than the alternatives. Then have follow up programs when their finish treatment. Don’t send them back to the streets to live .
Close the loopholes as they open up . Just an idea

[Love the rock]

DustMagnet you’re not understanding me . I know what safe injection sites are said to be for .I don’t believe watching the same person overdose over and over reduces harm to them . DustMagnet I’ve also spent most of my working life working in healthcare . It was my chosen field .I’ve dealt first hand with patients with brain damage through drugs and alcohol . You and may others feel it reduces harm enough to call it harm reduction I challenge that .

[rmpeers]

Whatever the effectiveness of injection sites, fact is, if the other pieces aren't in place, then the larger problem persists.

If indeed VicPD have been directed to go easy on dealers, then that's obviously going to make the overall situation worse.

Anyone with any common sense or human compassion (or a soul) could surely see that dealers need to be curtailed. That fact that Counc Isitt and his ilk see the police as the problem is astonishing.

In any case, better enforcement of pushers is surely a logical and easy step to take. Perhaps some of the mayor and council's generous travel budget could be better reallocated for this purpose.

[DustMagnet]

DustMagnet you’re not understanding me . I know what safe injection sites are said to be for .I don’t believe watching the same person overdose over and over reduces harm to them . DustMagnet I’ve also spent most of my working life working in healthcare . It was my chosen field .I’ve dealt first hand with patients with brain damage through drugs and alcohol . You and may others feel it reduces harm enough to call it harm reduction I challenge that .

 

Ok, I will henceforth only refer to this concept as death reduction, since death is only one facet of harm.

[Nparker]

Death deferment might be more accurate. Unless an addict can get treatment and away from the endless cycle of overdose/revival, their usage will hasten their demise. It's also simply no way to live, even if death isn't imminent.