STUDY FINDS NO CRIME INCREASE AROUND VANCOUVER INJECTION SITE

VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- A safe injection site for drug addicts
to shoot up under medical supervision has not brought more crime or
attracted drug dealers or users from other jurisdictions, according
to a police-commissioned study.

The report by Irwin M. Cohen, a criminologist commissioned to examine
the site for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, is expected to be
considered by Prime Minister Stephen Harper before he decides whether
to renew a legal exemption for Insite from a section of the
Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

Insite, located in the Downtown Eastside slum between the downtown
area and Chinatown, is run by Vancouver Coastal Health Authority
under a Health Canada exemption that expires Sept. 12.

"Some of the major concerns by those who were not in favor of
supervised drug injection sites have not borne out - this idea that
if we cluster drug users in a very specific area around this site
you're going to have public nuisance increases, you're going to have
crime increases," wrote Cohen, a professor at University College of
the Fraser Valley.

Backers, including some health experts, have touted the site for
reducing the spread of AIDS, which is often transmitted by drug users
sharing hypodermic syringes.

Harper, who has not attended an international AIDS conference this
week in Toronto, said in May he was waiting for evaluations from the
Mounties and other agencies before deciding whether to extend the exemption.

In a separate study, Raymond R. Corrado, a criminologist at Simon
Fraser University, reviewed 25 English peer-reviewed journal articles
and United Nations-commissioned reports on injection sites in
Australia, Germany, Spain, Switzerland and the Netherlands, and
applied those findings to the experience to date in Vancouver.

"I would say from a research perspective, not from a citizen's
perspective, the experiment should continue," Corrado said.

Dr. Thomas Kerr, an associate professor of medicine at the University
of British Columbia and research scientist at the British Columbia
Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS, said crime actually has declined
in the drug-infested Downtown Eastside since Insite opened there.

"We've published a study in the Canadian Medical Association Journal
showing that the establishment of the site led to substantial
reductions in public disorder," Kerr said. "We did see a reduction in
car break-ins in the neighborhood."

Tony Lam, president of the Vancouver Chinatown Business Improvement
Association, said merchants in the historic neighborhood noticed drug
activity is much quieter since the site opened.

"They don't get together in the back lanes or under the stairways to
get injections, so the outside look of Chinatown is much (more)
peaceful than before," Lam said.