I gotta tell ya'll, this was a tough article to write objectively, I wanna hear what you think! I had strong opinions on this subject at first, and then I did some research. Not saying my thoughts changed, but new questions did pop into my mind. "Safe injection Houses" are here in the USA. What are they and what do you think about them?
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A "safe house" for drug users to use drugs with clean equipment and trained professional supervision using public funding.....what the what????!!! Am I reading this correctly? This instantly stirred up strong feelings and opinions for this nurse, mom and taxpayer. While this concept was news to me, "safe injection houses", which are currently illegal in the United States, have secretly been in existence in the US for at least 3 years. The idea is to provide drug users with clean needles and equipment as well as medical supervision by professionals in the event of overdose. The staff on hand is also available to guide, educated and provide services to willing participants who wish to get clean. Injection sites are legal in countries such as Australia, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Switzerland. This is different than the clean needle exchange programs that at one time were also illegal in the US and now are legal in 33 states.
I read an article in the New York Post about two researchers who secretly evaluated a "safe injection house" in the United States. This sparked my interest to research more on the subject so that I could form a more educated opinion on the matter. According to a New York Post article, two researchers have been evaluating a "safe injection house" for over two years and recently published their report online in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine. "As a condition of their research, they didn't disclose the location of the facility - which is unsanctioned and potentially illegal - or the social service agency running it", reports The New York Post.
According to the researchers, the underground space consists of two rooms. One "injection room" with stainless steel clean stations with stools and mirrors. Drugs such as heroin, cocaine, methamphetamines, and pain pills are allowed to be used there, however smoking is not. The second room is where participants go afterward to be monitored by trained "non-medically licensed" staff. Not much information was provided through the research. It is presented that over 100 participants utilized the "safe injection house" more than 2,500 times. They released that only 2 overdoses were reported and one death at the site itself, but little to no additional information on population, cost service etc due to the secrecy of the program.
Such sites have been backed by lawmakers in New York and California, along with officials in cities like Seattle, San Francisco, Boston, and Ithaca, New York in an effort to combat overdose rates as well as drug use related transmission of Hepatitis C and HIV. This report may help support lawmakers in their efforts to pass laws allowing "safe injections" to exist in the US. As one would expect, there are many opponents to "safe injection sites", for a number of reasons. According to the New York Post article: "critics have argued these places may undermine prevention and treatment, and seem to fly in the face of laws aimed at stopping use of deadly illicit drugs."
As nurses we have a duty to do no harm. If we know that these drugs are so harmful that they cause death, have long term side effects and addiction, how would we stand a collective group on this subject? It is an interesting topic that I am sure we will hear more about in the coming years. The initial response from those I talked to casually about this subject was that this is the worst idea anyone has ever come up with and how on earth did we get here as a society? After much discussion some interesting questions regarding this and other similar topics arose creating some "grey areas" in the thoughts.
In researching this, I think I am left with more questions than I answered for myself. I would love to hear what you all think. Do such places encourage drug use though ease of access and legal use? Would new users take advantage of "safe injection sites" to try new drugs? Who pays for these places? Does the cost of running them outweigh what is spent yearly in Emergency Room visits and hospitalizations for overdose or addiction treatments? What kind of regulations and research are needed to determine the societal worth of such places? What do you think?
