Credited with dramatically curbing needle-sharing and reducing blood-borne infections in Vancouver, the facility hits a milestone amid a new public health crisis
Ben Nelms/The Globe and Mail
Mr. Wilson, 67, first learned about supervised consumption in the fall of 1998, when the non-profit Portland Hotel Society convened an international symposium on solutions to drugs, crime and addiction at Oppenheimer Park, in East Vancouver. The idea of a sanctioned supervised consumption site percolated. Mr. Wilson became president of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users and advocated for a site alongside community organizer Ann Livingston, poet and activist Bud Osborn and PHS executives Liz Evans, Mark Townsend and Dan Small. They marched in the streets, attended health and police board meetings and flew to Ottawa to lobby policymakers. Critics balked at the idea, seeing it as state-sanctioned drug use.
“It was fascinating to me that some people were saying, ‘This is terrible, encouraging drug use,’ and so on, and other people were saying it’s a health issue,” he told The Globe and Mail in a 2016 interview. “I had to go and figure out which it was.” Drug users demanded that their peers be involved in the process. The International Narcotics Control Board said opening such a site would violate international drug control treaties and tarnish Canada’s reputation. Workplace safety required proper ventilation. The College of Nurses questioned whether supervising drug injections was within the scope of nursing. Health authorities worried that the chairs and linoleum flooring selected for the site would be seen as “too nice” – frivolous spending.
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