Safe-injection site slashes fatal overdoses in Vancouver: report

[Electric Monk]

By Carmen Chai, Postmedia News April 17, 2011 7:01 PM

With a Supreme Court of Canada case looming this summer that could decide its future, Vancouver’s safe-injection drug site has received an extra shot in the arm from a new report that says it has helped reduce the number of fatal overdoses in the city by 35 per cent.

The report, compiled by Canadian scientists from the Urban Health Research Initiative, the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS and St. Paul’s Hospital, goes on to argue that Vancouver’s Insite — the country’s first safe-injection facility — should be replicated in other North American cities where drug use is a common problem.

The team’s findings and recommendations were published Sunday in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet.

(snip)

Results showed that 31 per cent of 290 overdose deaths occurred in the city blocks closest to facility. Once the site was opened, fatality rates in this area decreased by 35 per cent to 165 deaths from 254 per 100,000 people each year.

Fatal overdose rates in the rest of the city once the site opened decreased by only nine per cent.

Read more: http://www.canada.com/health/Safe+injection+site+slashes+fatal+overdoses+Vancouver+report/4631377/story.html#ixzz1JphtBoSe

[marmar]

1. It's very pragmatic & sensible.....

nt

[aquart]

2. Go DaVinci's Inquest.

[stevedeshazer]

3. +1

Saves lives.

[applegrove]

4. In was put in place while the Liberals were in power. The neocons in Ottawa don't like it. Assholes!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insite

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

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