'We Refuse to Wait Any Longer'
Victoria harm reduction activists march, launch their own needle exchange.
Marchers to the City of Victoria and public health officials: "Read the research!"
Gallery: 'We Refuse to Wait Any Longer' »
It's been a year since Victoria's needle exchange closed. Activists going by the name Harm Reduction Victoria marked the day by marching through downtown then setting up their own guerrilla exchange.
"The Guerrilla Needle Exchange will be open every evening for an indefinite period of time, collecting and distributing safer drug use supplies in our community from a fixed site," said a statement from the group. "Since Victoria's only fixed-site needle exchange was closed... thousands of the most marginalized and stigmatized members of our community have been denied access to an essential health service."
Without access to clean needles, it said, people's lives are at risk. "Harm Reduction Victoria refuses to stand silently watching a public health crisis escalate," it said. "We refuse to wait any longer for our public health officials, municipal government delegates and the provincial government to take action."
Besides a fixed exchange, the group wants a safe consumption site for Victoria, which would be a first for the city. They also want the people operating mobile exchanges to be allowed to distribute needles in a large section of downtown they agreed last year to stay away from.
Related Tyee stories:
- Prison Guards Fear HIV, But Oppose Clean Needles
Supplying clean needles hands weapons to inmates, guards say. But as drug injection and tattooing sow disease, prison officials are desperate for remedies. - Fighter for Addicts Ready to Quit
Ann Livingston of VANDU is wearied by death. - Harm Reduction, '50s Style
The push for enlightened drug reform in Vancouver is 50 years old. Government crushed it then, as it wants to now.
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anarcho
2 years ago
Direct Action Does It!
Glad to see the Guerrilla Needle Exchange. Just let the criminals who oppose harm reduction - fearing it an entry point for treating addiction as a medical/social problem, thereby undermining their drug profits - try to stop them.
Perry
2 years ago
Prohibition politics enables organized crime
Politicians who support prohibition by continuing to view drugs and addiction not as health issues, but as moral and criminal issues, are in fact enabling organized crime. The evidence is strong and clear that almost all of the harms, to both individuals and society, associated with drug use are a result of prohibition policies, not the drugs themselves.
Now, Harper and his ilk are trying to get a new Bill passed (with Liberal support) that will impose mandatory sentences for drug crimes, an approach that has been a total failure in the U.S.. But what need do they have of evidence when they have religious ideology on their side?
What they do need is some strong soap to wash the blood off their hands of all the people who have suffered and died needlessly under their government.