Safe consumption site an emotional topic for many

By Letter to the Editor on August 18, 2018.

The topic of a safe consumption site in Medicine Hat is becoming an emotional one for lots of people.

We must not lose sight of the fact that the fentanyl crisis is a public health crisis and it is going to get worse before it gets better.

It has probably touched people we all know personally. The good people who are trying to open a safe consumption site here want to learn from the mistakes of those who have put sites in other parts of our province. That includes picking up needles, however needles are already here and have been around for a long time.

I think it would probably make more sense to spend money putting up needle containers.

However, what is upsetting me is the letter that appeared in Aug. 15 News (“Rumoured location of safe consumption sitecomes with too muxh ptential harm), decrying the suspected location of the new site — that it would be near schools where children would be.

I know we need to protect children but the drug addicts were once children. I know addicts that I knew as children. Some of those children that the letter writer is talking about will grow up to be addicts if we can not get this particular public health emergency under control. Drugs affect every one in society.

Diane MacNaughton

Medicine Hat

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