INJECTING ROOMS WORK WELL ELSEWHERE

PETER HEMMING (Letters, December 31) suggests that heroin users will
not enter a safe injecting room if it is established in Civic.

In cities which have provided safe injecting facilities, such as
Frankfurt am Main, Berne, Zurich, to name a few, the facilities have
been used and appreciated. They have contributed to lessening the
harms. In Frankfurt, for example, deaths from overdose dropped from
147 in 1991 to 22 in 1997. The number of emergency overdoses dropped
from 100 per week in 1992 to two per week last year.

Mr Hemming makes the point that heroin users will not use the
facilities if they believe that the staff are picked by the government
to report on the users. The operational rules of a safe injecting room
should be framed so that the facility operates for the benefit of the
users, and the staff should be selected accordingly.

What is to be lost in trying something that has succeeded
elsewhere?

PETER WATNEY, Holt