FORUM TOLD DRUG INJECTING ROOM SAVING LIVES

SYDNEY -- Every single one of the 80 to 90 addicts who have collapsed in
Sydney's drug injecting room after shooting up have been saved, a forum was
told tonight.

Clinical services manager of the Kings Cross Medically Supervised Injecting
Centre, Colette McGarth (McGarth), told a public forum on drug treatment
programs at Potts Point in inner-Sydney that not one life has been lost
since the 18-month trial of the injecting room started in May.

And other speakers at the forum said there had been a noticeable drop in
addicts shooting up in public and tossing used needles into the streets
since the centre started operating.

Director of alcohol and drug services at St Vincents Hospital, Dr Alex
Wodak, who also spoke at the forum, said the general consensus on the
centre was that it was going well.

But a formal evaluation of the centre is only one-third of the way through
and full results would not be available for 12 months, he said.

"Colette McGarth did run through the results they've got to date and ...
they're certainly attracting a lot of visits to the centre," Dr Wodak said.

"Something like 80 or 90 people have collapsed following taking a drug (at
the centre) and 100 per cent of those people have been revived, there have
been no deaths.

"The general impression is that it's going well.

"Some of the other speakers (at the forum) commented that there's less
obvious drug injecting in public places in this neighbourhood, and there's
less discarding of used injecting equipment.

"I think it's encouraging but frankly I wouldn't have expected anything
less than that.

"Running a successful injecting room is not nearly as difficult as getting
one started in the first place."

Although the issue was not raised tonight, Dr Wodak said opposition to the
injecting room had "pretty well disappeared" since it opened.

Dr Wodak said those who attended the forum were mainly concerned about
crime, neighbourhood amenity and health issues of drug users.

He told those present more funding should be put toward health and social
services to combat the drug problem, rather than continuing to treat it as
a law and order issue.

"The fundamental mistake we've made in my view over the last few decades
has been to define these issues as if it was a criminal justice problem,
fund the law enforcement side very generously and fund the health and
social services that go towards this problem so begrudgingly," he said.