VANCOUVER DRUG FACILITY'S FUTURE ON HOLD

Victoria-Area MP Keith Martin Calls Minister's Announcement A Tragedy

Health Canada has put off making a final decision on Vancouver's safe
injection site.

More research needs to be done on how to get addicts off drugs,
Health Minister Tony Clement said in a news release issued Friday afternoon.

"Given the need for more facts, I am unable to approve the current
request to extend the Vancouver site for another 3 1/2 years," said Clement.

In the meantime, additional studies will be conducted into how
supervised injection sites affect crime, prevention and treatment.
The Vancouver injection site will stay open while the studies are conducted.

Called Insite, the pilot project allows addicts to shoot up their own
heroin or cocaine in the presence of a nurse, to prevent overdoses.
Insite was slated to close Sept. 12 if the Conservative government
refused to renew a three-year exemption under Canada's drug laws.

Victoria's plans for a supervised injection site, or sites, are
linked to Vancouver's fate. Cities must apply to the federal
government for an exemption to federal drug laws in order to legally
operate a site.

Friday's announcement doesn't necessary sound a death knell for a
similar facility to be set up in Victoria, say proponents.

Mayor Alan Lowe said that while he's disappointed in the federal
government's decision, "There is still a glimmer of hope because they
have not closed down Insite at this point.

"We will continue to proceed as we have been, because the information
that we'll be receiving from the research will be valuable not only
to help us prepare a request to Health Canada but also to determine
how we service the drug-addicted population in our city."

The time will be well spent learning more about Victoria's drug
users, added Dr. Richard Stanwick, chief medical health officer of
the Vancouver Island Health Authority.

"I think the critical thing is the door has not been closed," said Stanwick.

"I wouldn't necessarily be discouraged, but I think the bar is high.
If we're expected to meet the requirements, we'll have to be
exceptionally rigorous and diligent in identifying our research topic."

Keith Martin, a medical doctor and MP for Esquimalt-Juan de Fuca,
maintained the federal government's decision "puts opportunities for
Victoria, Toronto and Montreal -- all of who want safe-injection
sites -- off the table, which is a tragedy.

"The federal government, ideologically, does not support
safe-injection sites. It takes a moral, ideological viewpoint on
substance abuse and treats it like a judicial problem rather than a
medical problem."

In doing so, the Tories "are ignoring the facts, ignoring the
science," said Martin.

Secure consumption sites, where people can shoot drugs legally with
clean needles, are a good short-term intervention to reduce death and
disease but must be linked to longer-term services, said Benedikt
Fischer, a University of Victoria expert on illicit drugs.

"Those may include detox or residential care or other forms of
treatment and include appropriate psychiatric care which is an
important issue in the substance-user population," said Fischer,
director of the illicit drugs, public health and policy unit at the
Centre for Addictions Research B.C.

A lot of people who are addicted also have psychiatric issues, Fischer said.

People with psychiatric disorders, including depression and
personality disorders, often start experimenting or are exposed to
certain drugs, he said, and in doing so find these drugs help them
deal with their borderline psychiatric issues which either go
unrecognized, undiagnosed, or untreated.

Victoria is home to about 1,500 to 2,000 injection drug users. On
Vancouver Island in 2005, there were 47 new cases of HIV infection --
most of the people involved were intravenous drug users (44 per
cent). In 2003, the I-Track Surveillance project in Victoria reported
a 79-per-cent prevalence rate for hepatitis C among local injection drug users.

Allowing drug users to shoot up with clean needles will likely
prevent acute harm, Fischer said, but it will not resolve the
psychiatric issues that may have caused the addiction.