- James Westgate Snell

As Manitoba plans its first supervised drug consumption site in Winnipeg, Alberta’s minister responsible for addictions says residents are being deceived about the effectiveness of the sites that operate across Canada under a harm reduction model for managing addictions.

“Canadians have been lied to for the past 25 years, and it’s a failure of activist academics and ideologues, and they lied to us and told us that we had to choose between being compassionate to those in addiction or having safe communities,” said Dan Williams, Alberta’s minister of mental health and addiction. “That’s not the case.”

Alberta Minister of Mental Health and Addiction Dan Williams. Chris Schwarz/Government of Alberta PHOTO BY CHRIS SCHWARZ/GOVERNMENT OF ALBERTA /Winnipeg Sun

According to the Government of Canada, supervised consumption sites save lives and help communities. They provide a safe, clean area for users to bring their own drugs to use, in the presence of staff.

“This prevents accidental overdoses,” says a government website. “Supervised consumption sites may offer a range of evidence-based harm reduction services, such as drug checking. The sites also provide access to important health and social services, including substance use treatment for those who are ready.”

Alberta currently has seven supervised drug consumption sites and is transitioning to a recovery model that offers lasting change to addicts and safer communities, said Williams, noting the province is building 11 “recovery communities.”

Alberta plans to close a supervised consumption site in Red Deer in the coming months — replacing it with recovery-oriented healthcare.

Opioid overdose deaths in Alberta have decreased 55% from May 2023 to May 2024, according to government statistics. Numbers from January to May 2023 compared to January to May 2024, indicate opioid deaths have decreased 33%.

“So, I highly recommend that Manitoba, or any province that’s looking at drug consumption sites, takes a look at number one, what is the real need? Is it drug consumption sites, or is it treatment and recovery?” said Williams.“Number two, are you talking to your communities? Do you have a very thorough and thought-out community consultation that truly considers the effect these sites have on community and public safety?”

Canada experienced 47,162 opioid overdose deaths between 2016 and March of 2024.

Discarded needle on the street — Supervised injection sites can’t be the only strategy used to mitigate overdose deaths. PHOTO BY BRENDAN MILLER /Postmedia

In response to overdose deaths, Manitoba announced in July a partnership with the Aboriginal Health and Wellness Centre of Winnipeg to establish Canada’s first Indigenous-led supervised consumption site with wraparound care. The province is providing $727,000 to support development. There is no firm opening date.

“There’s never been an overdose death or drug poisoning death in a supervised consumption site, which I think is remarkable given the amount of people who have visited them,” said Dr. Erin Knight, medical lead with Rapid Access to Addiction Medicine for Shared Health.“They also have been shown to decrease treatment-related harms like HIV and other sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections, which is important in terms of the overall burden on the health-care system.”

Supervised consumption sites create more harm than good, said a national addictions expert who asked the Winnipeg Sun for anonymity. The sites increase crime, perpetuate addiction and increase social disorder, they said.

“So, when people have this popular claim that nobody’s died in the supervised consumption site, there’s actually no way of knowing that, unless you were collecting some sort of registration on admission, which is not a requirement,” they said.

B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario are reconsidering or closing — to varying degrees — supervised consumption sites and moving towards a recovery model, said the source, adding Manitoba should consider failures in other jurisdictions before advancing a potentially obsolete model.Williams said law enforcement has a critical role in mitigating the drug crisis.

“The truth is, between a harm reduction policy coming out of Ottawa where they supply the drugs — government heroin — en masse, distributed, unwitnessed and zero tools left for our police services, whether it’s RCMP or municipal police to address the often violent and criminal life that surrounds drug dealing, the police have had their hands tied,” he said.

“Court systems have been turned into a turnstile, rather than a place where we address the crime and insecurity that communities are facing.”Knight said it’s important to examine the pillars of addiction medicine: prevention, harm reduction, treatment and enforcement.

“Any good approach to substance use interventions is going to have all of those,” she said. “And so, supervised consumption is one aspect of the harm reduction pillar, which is important in terms of engaging with people who use substances. It’s not the be all, end all, but it’s a very important piece.”

According to research published in The Lancet, supervised consumption sites prevent overdose deaths on site.

“However, less is known about their effect on population-level overdose mortality,” said researchers.

British Columbia, known for drug infestation on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver and “safe” government-supplied hard drugs has experienced a large increase in overdose deaths despite supervised consumption sites and other harm reduction measures.

There were 334 deaths in 2013 and 2,511 deaths in 2023, according to the B.C. Coroners Service.