FREE HEROIN EXPERIMENT CAUSES DISMAY

East Hastings Location Close To Special Housing, Day Care, School

A plan to conduct a two-year scientific experiment in giving free heroin to
a select group of addicts has people buzzing with dismay this week in the
Downtown Eastside.

But it's not the concept they're objecting to.

Instead, the main complaint is about the planned location for the
experiment -- the northwest corner of East Hastings and Heatley. It's right
next door to a recently opened building dedicated to alcohol- and drug-free
housing, half a block from a day care, and one block from an elementary school.

The next complaint is that no one from the agencies planning the experiment
has come to talk to anyone -- a normal courtesy observed in the beleaguered
downtown neighbourhood that is shared by drug users, the country's highest
concentration of poor people, social agencies, businesses and regular
residents.

"It could be a very brilliant concept, but the process really is a
problem," said James Kennedy, who operates a training cafe for young people
at risk and is the chair of the local Strathcona Area Merchants Society.
"And the location is brutal."

Even more concerned is the president of Union Gospel Mission, which just
opened an 81-unit housing facility next door to the proposed site. The
housing facility is dedicated to people who want to kick their alcohol or
drug habits.

"It's a place where people come to find freedom from drugs. There must be a
block that's more suited, instead of having this jammed up next to a
building where people have come to get away from drugs," said Maurice McElrea.

Kennedy and McElrea are two of about 200 people and community agencies near
the 600-block East Hastings who got notices from the city Friday that the
University of B.C.-sponsored trial has applied for a development permit for
the building at the northwest corner of East Hastings and Heatley, with
operations slated to start in March.

The trial, which has been in the planning for five years and still has not
received final federal approvals, aims to replicate experiments that have
been done in Europe to look at whether medically prescribed heroin produces
better results than methadone in helping long-term drug users' health and
quality of life.

Swiss and Dutch experiments have shown that those given heroin were
arrested less, had a higher chance of holding down a job, and went through
fewer bouts of homelessness.

The trial, called the North American Opiate Medication Initiative or NAOMI,
is to be conducted in Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto simultaneously with
470 subjects in total. In Vancouver, 158 users would be selected for the
experiment, with 70 getting methadone and 88 getting heroin.

According to the explanatory letter that went out to the community, only
the selected clients will come to the clinic, visiting up to three times a
day during its 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. opening hours.

The experiment has already received $8.1 million from the Canadian
Institutes of Health Research and all three study sites received final
approval from the ethics review boards in June 2002, but it has been
stalled in other regulatory approvals processes. As well, it still needs
about another $2 million to cover all the costs of the pilot.

The project team has been hunting for a site for at least two years,
looking at almost two dozen sites during that period. Although there had
been some behind-the-scenes pressure from the previous Non-Partisan
Association city council to put the site at St. Paul's Hospital,
researchers maintained the experimental site needed to be close to where
drug users live if it was going to have any impact.

It has been an open secret in Vancouver during that time that the
experiment is planned, but federal government policies have prohibited
those involved from speaking publicly.

University of B.C. researcher Dr. Martin Schecter, a lead proponent for the
project who was in Toronto Wednesday for a meeting with project
researchers, could only say: "We are working to get all the necessary
approvals we have to obtain before we can do this study."

However, the project team was required to supply extensive details about
the planned project to the community as part of the development permit process.

But in spite of the four pages of information and diagrams supplied, many
are concerned that the community isn't getting any of it because the
majority of businesses and residents nearby know only Chinese.

Joe Chaput, a Vancouver business operator who lives directly behind the
proposed site, said the letters came only in English.

"I tried to explain it to my neighbour but he didn't really understand me,"
said Chaput, who's worried about the volume of traffic it will generate,
with up to 30 users an hour going in and out of both front and rear entrances.

Chaput said the area, about four blocks east of Main and Hastings, has been
relatively quiet the past couple of years.

Chaput is also concerned about the deadline given for residents to respond
to the city -- less than two weeks away, on Oct. 24.

But city project planner Michael Mortensen is already working on that part
of the problem.

Mortensen said the deadline is going to be extended to Nov. 3 and letters
in Chinese will be sent out by the end of this week.

As well, he pointed out that anyone can continue to register complaints or
concerns with the city at any point up until the decision is made.

What is likely to be a continuing subject of community friction, however,
is the site location and the relationship with the project team.

The team is planning to see what the community response is to the
development permit proposal, and then organize one or several meetings to
hold discussions.

That's leaving it too long in some people's eyes.

"I'm assuming they'll [the project team] be in here on Monday to do
community consultation," said Kennedy, who has been getting a flood of
e-mails from local resident and business groups concerned about the plan.

Kennedy said they aren't expressing concerns about the general idea of
giving free heroin to local users.

"Most people here are very supportive of the four pillars [the city's drug
strategy] and very patient in waiting for things to evolve."

The plan means giving drugs to "80 people a day who are using this product
anyway."

Besides, he said, "it can't get worse" and there might even be a benefit if
fewer people are having to break into cars and houses to get money for drugs.

But people would like the city to consider whether the 600 block is the
best site.

Kennedy pointed out that the former Buddhist temple at Hastings and Gore,
now owned by the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, is sitting empty and
would make a much more suitable site, since it is less residential and
closer to the main centre of drug activity in the Downtown Eastside.

Recent studies have estimated there are 60,000 to 100,000 heroin users in
Canada, with 500 to 1,000 overdose deaths a year among them. More than half
have acute health problems, multiple mental-health problems, and no
permanent housing. Two-thirds resort to illegal activities to earn money.

Although methadone was introduced to Canada in the 1960s as a substitute
for heroin users trying to quit, only about a quarter of heroin users are
in a methadone program at any time. Many people either refuse to enter a
methadone program or try and drop out.

Subjects will be chosen by the researchers and will be restricted to
current residents of the Downtown Eastside who are long-term heroin users
and whose previous episodes of trying methadone failed.

People going through the criminal justice system will be excluded, as will
people whose medical or psychiatric conditions indicate they wouldn't be
good subjects for heroin treatment.

Subjects will get paid for their research visits.

The project has been guided by an advisory committee that includes the
RCMP, Vancouver police, College of Physicians and Surgeons, College of
Pharmacists, the provincial and city governments, and the health authority.

Vancouver police spokeswoman Constable Sarah Bloor said police are
supportive of the pilot project as part of the continuum of options for
drug treatment.

"It's a health initiative and we support health initiatives."

Mayor Larry Campbell also said he supports it as part of the continuum of
care in the city.

He said he thinks it will be even less intrusive than the city's authorized
injection site for drug users, which has attracted almost 3,000 visits in
its first month of operation with little incident.

He said he hasn't heard any complaints about the location and can't imagine
why there would be any.

"Where are the addicts now? This is 140 people who won't be injecting in
the alleys."