It is 2012, and in a clean, clinical room in Denmark, Angelea smokes crack cocaine to aid chronic pain in her left leg – the result of a serious car accident. She brings her drugs to the smoking room; they are tested for purity under a microscope. Constantly supervised by nurses, Angelea feels safe, dignified and respected. Most importantly, she is given further resources to help; she has greater control over her future.
Mention the subject of drug addiction and most people think criminals. Me? I think victims: people with a medical condition that needs properly cared for. Until we accept this definition the problem will only get worse. So, how can we make it better? How can we fix this? One possibility, already having dramatic results on the continent, is fix-rooms, properly known as consumption rooms. Fix-rooms are safe spaces where users can take illegal narcotics under supervision. Fix-rooms already exist in Denmark, Switzerland, Holland and Canada. Fix-rooms could help fix problems here in the UK.
The facility where we met Angelea earlier is called Skyen and it accommodates between 500 and 700 drug intakes per day. This project has quite literally changed the way of life for over 5000 drug addicts in Denmark. I would love to see similar projects running in the UK and I hope to convince you of the benefits of fix-rooms for the good of all.
Fix-rooms are safe and hygienic spaces for victims of drug addiction. In the UK, in litter-strewn back streets and grubby hostels, addicts share drugs and needles. The use of a fix-room gives drug addicts a haven, free from disease and infection. By providing clean facilities and clean equipment (e.g. syringes), fix-rooms reduce injecting-risk behaviour (syringe sharing), ultimately reducing the risk of HIV transmission and fatal overdoses.
The UK now has the worst drug mortality rate in Europe: in 2017 Denmark recorded 237 overdose deaths whereas the UK recorded 3,256 – an unacceptable and avoidable loss of 3019 lives. Scotland holds the unenviable prize of first place for the highest drug mortality rate in Europe – that’s a scandal of epic proportions and the fact that our UK neighbours, England and Wales, share third place is no consolation. We are clearly getting our approach to drugs wrong in the UK.
Fix-rooms would be a step in the right direction for us since there has never been a recorded death in any of the 78 fix-rooms that exist on the continent! They employ highly trained medical staff who care for the needs and the safety of the victims of drug addiction. If something goes wrong they are there to administer antidotes and immediately resuscitate the patients. Surely in Scotland, with its harsher climates and notoriously poorer diet (which contribute to our poor health), there is an even greater need for facilities like these to help reduce our drug deaths?
Many would argue that fix-rooms encourage illegal drug use but this is nonsensical since no one (except a drug user) would appear at the door of what is effectively a clinic seeking to become a drug user! Views like that are symptomatic of the failures in drug policy that fix-rooms would go a long way to repairing! If we stopped criminalising addicts and increased their access to health and social care services then we might just start to get things fixed.
According to a survey conducted by the International Network of Drug Consumption, 78% of professional groups represented in fix-room teams are social workers. A Canadian cohort study showed that the use of a Vancouver fix-room was associated with increased rates of people referred to addiction care centres and increased rate of the uptake of detoxification treatments. Fix-rooms don’t take away the significance of addiction aid; they support, promote and provide care.
Wouldn’t you like to walk into the city centre or a park without worrying about discarded syringes? Introducing fix-rooms significantly reduces public drug use, discarded syringes and wider societal impact. Before Skyen opened as many as 10,000 syringes were found on the streets of Vesterbro – this significantly decreased to 1000 after a year of its opening. Not only would our streets be safer for everyone, but we would also significantly reduce the pressure on our emergency services. There would be fewer calls to the police regarding public drug use, and fewer ambulance call-outs related to overdoses. Fix-rooms have proven that their use can significantly reduce the financial and social burden on society associated with drug addiction.
To addicts, fix-rooms are a god-send, however many in power believe they aren’t of any use despite the clear evidence to the contrary. The Home Office has dismissed the positive prospects of fix-rooms and parroted the old lies about them becoming a focus ‘of crimes’ and are intent on continuing their plans for more treatment facilities and more focus on disrupting drug supplies – the much-fabled war on drugs that has failed time and time again! Their words are also quite hollow since they have repeatedly cut treatment budgets causing a 26% rise in drug-related deaths in England (2013-2016). Steve Rolles, a senior policy analyst at the Transform Drug Policy Foundation, which campaigns for the legalisation and Government regulation of drugs, said: “The idea that eradication or a drug free society can be achieved through enforcement is clearly ridiculous.” The harsh reality is that the government are blind to the real problems of addicts and are determined to criminalise and demonise them rather than assist them in combating their conditions. Short-sighted government policies that continue to criminalise drug addicts and condemn them to suffer in the crippling conditions associated with dependence mean that we will never solve the problem. We need to change the focus from criminal to care.
By accepting the need for health services to be the lead focus in drug addiction and funding fix-rooms we could dramatically reduce the number of fatal overdoses, discarded syringes and reduce the risk of HIV among vulnerable and desperate people in need of our support. We could decrease the number of drug-related emergency call outs and increase the number of addicts referred to treatment facilities. I accept that there is no magic-bullet solution to fix this but fix-rooms are a positive step in the right direction and they would, most certainly, dramatically reduce drug-related crime and drug-related deaths . . . and surely that’s worth fixing!
Bibliography
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-38531307
How ‘fixing rooms’ are saving the lives of drug addicts | Mattha …www.theguardian.com › world › commentisfree › nov › fixing-rooms…
Why ‘fix rooms’ might be an answer to Scotland’s drug …news.stv.tv › politics › 1437423-drug-fix-rooms-should-be-introduce…
UK government rejecting ‘fix rooms’ in Glasgow ‘stands in the …www.dailyrecord.co.uk › News › Scottish News › Drugs
http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/system/files/publications/2734/POD_Drug%20consumption%20rooms.pdf
http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/countries/drug-reports/2019/spain_en