By Scott Roblin

Medicine Hat one step closer to safe consumption site

May 7, 2018 | 4:59 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Like many communities across Canada, Medicine Hat is looking for ways to limit the impact and spread of the national opioid crisis.

Last year, Medicine Hat Police administered naloxone 32 times for opioid overdoses, and Insp. Tim McGough said it’s not getting any better.

“So far this year, we’ve administered on 12 people,” said McGough. “So, we’re on track to either meet last year’s overdoses or exceed them.”

Hoping to prevent future overdoses, the province has approved HIV Community Link’s request to pursue a safe consumption site in the city.

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Trained staff would be staffed at the centre to oversee clients using drugs as a safety net in case of an overdose, while also providing guidance to those wanting to get clean.

HIV Community Link Executive Director Leslie Hill said a supervised site is a pressing need in Medicine Hat and is happy to see the province taking note.

“This is an escalating crisis in Medicine Hat,” said Hill. “So, our coalition took all that information and made the recommendation to implement supervised consumption services to the province, because we see it as an opportunity to get in front of this as an emerging issue.”

The province will be providing a start-up grant of $900,000 to get the program ready to launch, however federal approval is still needed before the site goes ahead.

Hill expects to submit their formal application to the province sometime in June.

No location has yet been chosen for the supervised site, but it could be located at the Medicine Hat Cares Centre.

According to Hill, the HIV Community Link building was the overwhelming choice for 185 local drug users surveyed in the past year.

“Eighty-three percent of them said HIV Community Link, and that dropped off significantly when we looked at other locations like a community health centre or other organizations in the community,” she said.

She added that was due to the trust formed between HIV Community Link employees and their over 400 registered clients.

Colleen Hillock runs one of Canada’s only post-secondary addictions counselling programs at Medicine Hat College.

Hillock refuted the idea that safe injection sites breed more addicts and make the problem worse.

“It’s safer for the community to have people who use drugs go to a place,” said Hillock. “They can dispose their needles there, they’re not perpetuating disease like Hepatitis C, HIV, that type of thing. So, it actually makes a safer community.”

The study from the Medicine Hat Coalition on Supervised Consumption also found that the South Zone of AHS had the highest rate of opioid-related emergency room visits in Alberta.

According to Hillock, a safe consumption site would be a vital tool for her students wanting to enter the field of addictions treatment.

“I would say about a third of our students in the Medicine Hat College program choose to go into harm reduction strategies,” she said. “So, it’s critical that these facilities are available for our students to work in.”

McGough said getting a safe consumption site would be a good start, but added more community supports are needed to end the opioid crisis.

“Addiction is basically a social, complex issue,” he said. “And, we need various solutions in order to combat that and assist those people in need.”

HIV Community Link is hoping to have a safe consumption site approved by the federal government and running by the fall.