No one disputes that the ideal outcome is for people to stop using drugs. But that can’t happen instantly
To those uninitiated in the global fight against the opioid crisis, the idea of delivering safe opioids through vending machines might sound ridiculous, counterintuitive and even dangerous.
The idea was raised late last year by Dr. Mark Tyndall, executive medical director of the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, who suggested that machines could dispense pills at supportive housing facilities or supervised consumption sites.
Many Canadians – including one of my medical school classmates who wrote a column on the topic for the National Post – believe that the government’s focus should be getting people off drugs, not supplying them with them. Alberta United Conservative Party leader Jason Kenney echoed that sentiment recently, saying in an interview that, “Helping addicts inject poison into their bodies is not a solution to the problem of addiction.”
But a mountain of research and rooms full of professionals will tell you that it is, in fact, part of a solution: that addressing addiction is a long-term effort. The opioid epidemic is killing at least eight people per day in this country. And as we struggle to fight it, we don’t always have time to fight the addiction first. We need to fight to keep people alive.
At its core, harm reduction is about showing compassion to people with addiction issues and removing the stigma that may keep them from seeking help. It recognizes that if people are going to use drugs, they might as well do so in as safe an environment as possible. Most importantly, it’s about prioritizing a person’s life ahead of their addiction.