Pubdate: Sat, 05 Aug 2017
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Copyright: 2017 Postmedia Network Inc.
Contact:  http://www.ottawacitizen.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326
Author: Aedan Helmer
Page: A4

OPIOID SUBSTITUTION PROPOSAL GAINS FRESH SUPPORT

News that an Ottawa group is moving to start an opioid-substitution
program - a form of supervised injection project - for city addicts is
being applauded by another harm-reduction group that says it wants to
follow suit.

Meanwhile, city police and the local city councillor say they need to
find out more about the new program before commenting on it.

Ottawa Inner City Health is a not-for-profit that receives some
provincial funding. It told the Citizen this week it wants to have a
managed-opioid program running at the Shepherds of Good Hope in the
ByWard Market by September.

It said efforts to launch the project have been sped up in response to
the fentanyl crisis that's sweeping the country. The program is meant
to get addicts off street drugs that are increasingly being laced with
deadly fentanyl.

Addicts would be prescribed the legal drug hydromorphone as a
replacement for the street opioids. They would inject it or take it
orally several times a day under supervision.

On Friday, the Sandy Hill Community Health Centre says it would like
to follow Inner City Health's lead.

The Sandy Hill centre received preliminary federal approval just last
week for a supervised-injection site of a different stripe.

There, injection drug users inject their own illegal drugs under
supervision in a sterile location.

There is some lingering confusion over the Inner City Health proposal
and how it fits with the city's drug strategy, Rob Boyd, director of
the Sandy Hill CHC's Oasis program, acknowledged Friday.

Boyd said the proposal would provide people with "another option that
might be more acceptable to them" than the methadone or suboxone
(buprenorphine) options currently available to Oasis clients.

"Some people don't stabilize well with methadone, and the same with
buprenorphine," said Boyd. "So if we provide people with this as a
third option, as has been the experience in Europe, you get more
people into care, because it's something more familiar, and it engages
them into the routine of a structured treatment, and provides them
with a way to transition away from supervised opioid injection to an
oral formulation like methadone or suboxone."

Ottawa Public Health voiced its support for the Inner City Health
initiative, and ByWard Market BIA director Jasna Jennings likened the
proposal to a managed alcohol program, calling it "a great step in the
right direction to addressing people's needs in an immediate and
practical format.

"For the health of the community, any service that really tries to
work to get people off street drugs is seen as a huge benefit," she
said.

Ottawa police declined comment "until such time as we have more
information about the proposed program."

Rideau-Vanier Coun. Mathieu Fleury was unavailable for comment. A
spokeswoman said the councillor first learned of the proposal from the
Citizen's Thursday report, and has had no conversation with Inner City
Health on the topic. "We want to inform ourselves before making any
statement," Fleury's office stated.

Boyd said any confusion over the proposal is "understandable."

"There's a lot that's happening very quickly, and there are different
things layered over each other," he said, making the distinction
between a supervised injection site, which requires a federal
exemption for users to bring their own illegal drugs to the facility,
and the opioid substitution program, which requires no exemption,
"Because these are legal drugs prescribed for them to use."

Inner City Health executive director Wendy Muckle said their model is
simply "providing a service to people who we already provide health
care for," and "prescribing a medication we already prescribe."
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MAP posted-by: Matt