Pop-Up Safe Injection Site Hits Vancouver

published on September 28, 2016 by McCarton Ackerman, in the fix

The small operation consists of a couple of people trained in CPR, chairs, clean needles and naloxone.

With Insite, Vancouver’s lone safe injection site, currently operating at capacity, a DIY safe injection site in the city has emerged in order to service those who simply can’t wait.

VICE reported that a “harm reduction tent” has been set up for a week now in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside. Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) founder Ann Livingston operates the tent along with Sarah Blyth. The bare-bones operation consists of a couple of people trained in CPR, chairs, clean needles and naloxone.

Livingston and Blyth service 25 to 40 people each day, handing out supplies and supervising injecting drug users. Blyth clarified that the tent “is not Insite, it’s not supposed to function as Insite.” But the pop-up is serving a critical need because Insite is so busy that it can’t respond to street-level emergencies.

Although two new safe injection sites are supposed to open next year in Vancouver, it doesn’t address the overdoses currently taking place. "When you're dealing with emergencies like this, there's no time to wait for the government bureaucracy to do its job,” Blyth told VICE.

Blyth also noted that the fentanyl now showing up in batches of heroin has resulted in overdoses that aren’t able to be treated with traditional dosages of Narcan. Overdoses are now on the rise as a result of the tainted heroin, making additional harm reduction sites a necessity.

View the full article >>

Tags:

Insite

BC Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS

Search form

Pop-Up Safe Injection Site Hits Vancouver

Search form