Where there is breath, there is hope

What does an SCS look like?

1. Reception

This is the entry point of the SCS where participants are welcomed. Here they provide their name or anonymous handle and are then placed on a waiting list for the injection room by the receptionist. They can also make appointments to see the nurse or counselor.

2. Waiting Area

Participants then proceed to the waiting area. When a booth opens up in the injection room a staff member will then call in the next participant on the list.

3. Injection Room

Once in the injection room, participants let the staff member know what drug they are using, and are then told which booth is available. There is a sink to wash their hands so they can avoid infections and a nursing station that provides them with clean sterile equipment.

While injecting in their booth, participants are monitored by the staff and nurses so they may intervene in the event of an overdose or provide safer injection education.

4. Clinic

Here participants can receive care, treatment and support for health issues and concerns, as well as education on how to reduce the harm from injection drug use.

5. Counseling and Support Offices

Here participants may meet with counselors, seek detox and treatment options, or other referrals to services, such as housing and mental health services.

6. Chill Lounge

Here participants can stay as long as they need until they feel safe enough to go outside. At InSite, this area is staffed by peers who are active and former drug users. They provide participants with coffee and juice as well as helpful information about community services, shelters and meal providers in the community.

7. Detox and supportive housing

InSite also provides detox (2nd floor) and supportive housing for those seeking treatment (3rd floor). This allows participants to avoid long waiting lists and get more immediate access to treatment when they are ready. In the spirit of integrated care, King County currently has plans to make buprenorphine available in proposed SCSs.

What is the evidence?

SCS offer a doorway to recovery
Relationship and community are central to recovery. Safe consumption spaces allow people who inject drugs to build trusted relationships with providers and community health workers in a stigma-free environment. Through SCSs, care providers can walk alongside people who inject drugs and be there when they’re ready to make a change. Studies have shown participants of SCSs are more likely to enter detox and treatment services.

SCS Cost Less
Addiction and drug use weighs heavily on society and the system. Safe consumption spaces have been proven to reduce that burden and save tax payers money. North America’s only safe injection site saves tax payers 6 million dollars a year based on a cost-benefit analysis funded by the Conservative Government of Canada. In the United States, separate studies projected saving tax payers 3.5 million dollars a year in San Francisco and 6 million dollars a year in Baltimore by having safe consumption spaces in each city.

SCS Make Communities Safer By:

  • Discarded syringes on the street
  • Public drug use
  • Overdose death
  • The spread of HIV and hepatitis C
  • Costs to the criminal justice system

SCS Myths & Facts

Myth

Safe consumption spaces (SCSs) will increase public disorder in their surrounding communities.

Fact

Safe consumption spaces reduce public drug use and discarded syringes in communities surrounding SCSs and increase public safety. Read some studies here and here.

Myth

Safe consumption spaces encourage drug use.

Fact

Studies have shown that safe consumption spaces do not encourage drug use. In fact they encourage treatment. Read some studies here, here and another one here.

Myth

Safe consumption spaces cost too much.

Fact

Safe consumption spaces actually save tax payers money:

  • Read the cost benefit analysis for Vancouver’s InSite here.
  • Read the cost benefit analysis for a proposed site in Baltimore here.
  • Read the cost benefit analysis for a proposed site in San Francisco here.

Myth

The studies on supervised consumption sites are flawed.

Fact

Studies and articles written about the benefits of safe consumption spaces are peer-reviewed, meaning these articles are written by experts and are reviewed by several other experts in the field before the article is published in the journal in order to ensure the article’s accuracy.
Reports written against safe consumption spaces are heavily flawed, not peer-reviewed and often funded by those ideologically opposed to safe consumption spaces. You can read an article about it here.

Myth

Vancouver’s overdose death rates have risen.

Fact

InSite is still saving lives. There has been a tragic increase in Vancouver’s overdose death rates recently due to Fentanyl. All of these deaths have occurred outside of InSite and despite an increase in overdose interventions at InSite there has still been zero deaths.

To address the opioid epidemic in Canada and due to the proven success of InSite, there have now been several more safe consumption spaces opened in Vancouver and across Canada.

Myth

Supervised consumption spaces make it easier for people to get drugs.

Fact

Safe consumption spaces do not provide illegal drugs to users or promote drug use in any way. An SCS is a safe and clean place for people to use the drugs they have in the presence of a trained health-care provider.

Further Reading

The content of this page has been adapted from Yes to SCS, a campaign to establish safe consumption spaces in Seattle, WA.