The Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users receives only $118,000 from
the Vancouver/Richmond Health Board, not the $300,000 cited in the
Aug. 31 article, "Planned safe-injection site faces opposition in area."

VANDU is a non-profit organization which provides lifesaving services
to drug-users. Its members are primarily drug-users or former users.

They operate according to the harm reduction model, a set of practical
and proven strategies with the goal of meeting drug users on their own
territory to help them reduce harm associated with their drug use.
Their noble activities include: peer-support and education; street
patrols (cleaning dirty needles off streets and watching for people
who may need medical attention); hospital visits (providing moral
support and essentials like clean underwear and razors); and methadone
support-groups.

Vancouver has the highest rate of drug-use and drug-associated health
problems, including HIV and hepatitis, in Canada. The latest
scientific evidence has proven that drug addiction should be
approached as a treatable biopsychosocial disease, but the recent War
on Drugs has left a chasm of distrust between drug-users and public
officials that makes appropriate treatment difficult to impossible.
VANDU is in a unique position to access drug-users whom physicians and
other health-professionals cannot reach.

Alana Hirsh, MD
Vancouver