Ontario has banned supervised drug consumption sites within 200 metres of schools and child-care centres.
Ten facilities across the province will be forced to stop providing safe consumption services by March 2025, and they will be given the option to transition into “treatment hubs.”
Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced the decision Tuesday afternoon when she addressed the Association of Municipalities of Ontario conference in Ottawa.
Of the 10 sites that will be affected by the new rules, five are in Toronto while one each are in Ottawa, Kitchener, Thunder Bay, Hamilton and Guelph. The Government of Canada lists 23 safe consumption sites in Ontario on its website.
Supervised consumption sites allow people to inject, snort or otherwise take drugs under supervision to reduce the risk of overdose.
Province offers ‘HART Hubs’ instead
Jones said the province is investing $378 million in 19 of the new Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) Hubs. If the old consumption sites choose to apply to become a HART Hub, the province said they will be “prioritized.”
“Continuing to enable people to use drugs is not a pathway to treatment,” said Jones, adding her plan would lead to more people choosing treatment, “not just enabling drug use.”
HART Hubs will not offer “safer” supply, supervised drug consumption or needle exchange programs. Instead, they will offer other forms of support such as supportive housing, employment help and addiction care.
Jones said there is no one prescriptive formula, so communities can personalize the hubs to suit their needs. She said the province will not fund any new consumption sites to replace any that will close.
Asked whether the province had estimated the number of deaths that would result from closing existing consumption sites, based on the number of overdoses prevented there, Jones denied that would be an issue.
“People are not going to die,” she said. “They are going to get access to service.”
Jody Jollimore, executive director of CATIE, a Toronto-based organization spreading information and awareness about HIV and hepatitis C, disagreed.
“If these sites close down, people will use their drugs elsewhere — in parks, public washrooms or at home, where they will die if they overdose alone,” he wrote in an email to CBC. “We need to see a plan for new supervised consumption sites to meet the need.”
Organizations including the existing consumption sites that are affected by the 200-metre ban will have until October 2024 to apply to become a HART Hub.
Opposition parties react
In a statement, Ontario Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie agreed that “these sites should not be next to schools,” while calling for “smart, compassionate solutions” to the addiction and mental health crisis.
“Doug Ford is taking away more services,” she said. “He needs to be clear on how they will maintain the capacity required to provide treatment to those who need it.”
The Ontario NDP released a statement faulting the provincial government for taking away “critical public health supports from communities amidst an ongoing homelessness and addictions crisis.”
“Doug Ford has made the callous decision to take away a vital tool that saves lives,” said Windsor West MPP Lisa Gretzky, the party’s critic for mental health and addictions.
Nurses’ association calls move ‘a disaster’
Justin Piché, an associate professor of criminology at the University of Ottawa, welcomed expanded access to treatment, but he called the consumption site closures a short-sighted decision.
“Drug toxicity deaths will increase, and that’s the bottom line,” he said. “The province is making a big mistake that is going to cost people their lives.”
The Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario also criticized the closures, which its CEO warned would result in more overdoses and more discarded needles in the street, while also spreading infectious diseases.
“This is actually a death sentence for people that use substances,” said Doris Grinspun. “It’s a disaster.”
