INSITE OPERATORS SEEK CRACK SMOKING ROOM

Study Implies Correlation Between Crack Pipes, HIV
Transmission

The nonprofit society that operates the city's supervised injection
site plans to reapply to Health Canada for approval to open a room in
the facility to allow people to smoke crack cocaine.

The move by the PHS Community Services Society comes as a study
published this month in the Canadian Medical Association Journal
revealed a spike in HIV rates in the city's crack smokers.

"That study did surprise me that there was that serious correlation,"
said Mark Townsend, executive director of the PHS, which operates the
Insite drug injection site on East Hastings in conjunction with
Vancouver Coastal Health.

Study researchers tracked 1,048 crack cocaine users over a nine-year
period and found that 137 became HIV positive. The reason for the
increase is not definitive but could be attributed to wounds produced
around the mouth when smoking crack from a pipe, the researchers said.

"These wounds may make people who smoke crack more vulnerable to HIV
transmission during activities such as oral sex or sharing of crack
pipes," the study said.

The study's authors include doctors and researchers from the B.C.
Centre of Excellence in HIV/AIDS, Simon Fraser University and the
Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health and Addictions.

Researchers suggested distributing clean kits for smoking crack and
opening a supervised inhalation room as measures to combat HIV infection.

"Inhalation rooms and the distribution of safer crack kits also afford
the opportunity for health workers to engage with people who smoke
crack," the study said. "Such encounters may be critical for
initiating efforts to address some of the needs for health care,
social assistance and referral for addiction treatment of this often
hidden population.

Townsend said the society applied about three years ago to Health
Canada to get approval to open an inhalation room at Insite. But the
society never received a response.

This time Townsend hopes the report's findings coupled with support
from the province's chief medical health officer will prompt Health
Canada to take a fresh look at the need for an inhalation room.

Townsend said an inhalation room would work on the same principle as
the injection site, where drug users have a safe place to inject drugs
and have access to medical staff, counsellors and detox.

The injection site, which opened in September 2003, was designed to
accommodate an inhalation room. Several studies on Insite conclude the
facility helps reduce overdose deaths and prevents the spread of
infectious diseases.

Dr. Perry Kendall, the province's chief medical health officer, has
given the PHS society's application a boost by again publicly
endorsing a supervised inhalation room for crack smokers.

Kendall said he is on record back in September 2003 in support of a
scientific trial of an inhalation room. That's when the Insite
injection site opened on East Hastings.

But Kendall noted his support of a trial hasn't swayed the federal
government to open an inhalation room. A pending B.C. Court of Appeal
judgment on the future operation of Insite will likely delay any
response from the government, Kendall added.

The PHS plans to send its application to Health Canada within the
month. A Health Canada official said the policy of the federal
government's health agency is not to discuss the application when it
arrives.