SAFE-INJECTION SITE TRIES TO SWAY GOV'T

Backers of Insite Erect Crosses to Draw Attention to Renewing Exemption

VANCOUVER - In the past 18 months, 336 drug users overdosed at Insite,
Vancouver's safe-injection facility. None of the junkies died, thanks
to quick responses from trained staff.

Yesterday, the facility's supporters erected rows of wooden crosses at
Kitsilano's Vanier Park to illustrate the hundreds of lives they say
will be put at risk if Ottawa closes the facility.

The crosses represented the 336 overdoses at the facility between
March 1, 2004, to Aug. 30, 2005.

"Insite is helping to make our community safer and saving lives," said
Gillian Maxwell, a spokeswoman for Insite for Community Safety.

Insite, North America's first supervised injection site, opened in the
Downtown Eastside in September 2003. Health Canada issued it a
three-year exemption from Canada's narcotics law to allow drug users
to safely inject.

With a Sept. 12 deadline for extending the agreement looming,
supporters are worried. "Insite is making a big difference and we need
politicians to know that," said Maxwell, who said that fewer people
are injecting in public and tossing dirty needles in the city's parks
and on the streets.

The RCMP did not support the original exemption and doesn't endorse
any initiatives that promote drug use or legalization of banned substances.

Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan does support the site.

At yesterday's ceremony, many of the dozens of supporters told stories
of how Insite changed them.

On New Year's Day 2004, Darryl James overdosed at Insite. The
50-year-old heroin addict said workers saved his life. "If they shut
Insite down, there will be a lot of people dying," said James, who
called the site a "stepping stone."

He's now in the North American Opiate Medications Initiative program,
a clinical trial testing whether heroin is more effective than
methadone in helping chronic users.

"Soon, I'll be clean," James said. "I'm really working toward that and
without a doubt, Insite helped."

Federal Health Minister Tony Clement was unavailable for
comment.

His spokesman, Erik Waddell, said the government will not approve new
sites or commit to an extension of the site's exemption until it
completes an assessment of research results on supervised-injection
sites.

Insite has an average of 600 visits a day. There has never been a
death.