cover image: ACT Position Statement: Harm Reduction Services for People Who Inject Drugs (August 2017)

20.500.12592/gvb7ff

ACT Position Statement: Harm Reduction Services for People Who Inject Drugs (August 2017)

12 Apr 2022

Harm reduction distribution and establishing integrated supervised injection services are effective public health tools for reducing the spread of HIV and hepatitis C, and preventing unnecessary deaths from overdoses. [...] Background + context: In 1989, and in the face of ardent opposition from the police, Toronto Public Health began offering unused injection drug gear as part of a new needle distribution program called the Works. [...] The authors recommended that Toronto “would benefit from implementation of supervised injection facilities” and that “the optimal model” for such sites was a “fixed facility that is integrated within an existing organization.”2 In 2017, the City of Toronto Public Health . [...] For this, we encourage all proposed and future supervised injection sites to offer a range of supports to help care for people who use drugs who struggle with addiction, HIV and AIDS, hepatitis C, mental health challenges, and other physical sickness. [...] ACT believes in the benefit of comprehensive harm reduction strategies for all groups living at increased risk for HIV and hepatitis C, including safer sex tools, harm reduction distribution, safe injection sites and procedures for responding to an overdose.

Authors

Jocelyn Watchorn

Pages
3
Published in
Canada