Submitted by jonnycash11 t3_11glr63 in nyc
jonnycash11 OP t1_jaozq28 wrote
“OnPoint NYC, a nonprofit, opened the sites with backing from former Mayor Bill de Blasio in November 2021. Since then, the centers have helped prevent nearly 700 overdoses, OnPoint said. They have become pilgrimage sites for health officials, politicians and treatment groups around the country hoping to replicate them.
But the experiment in caring for people while they use drugs is at a crossroads. OnPoint said the private funding of around $1.4 million a year it uses to operate the sites will run out in February. Federal officials have until Jan. 9 to decide whether to continue backing a lawsuit against a proposed drug-use site in Philadelphia. The Justice Department said it is evaluating safe-use sites and protocols for operating them with state and local officials.
The Biden administration’s approach to the case will determine whether cities including New York decide they have firm legal standing to increase support and funding for safe-use sites, legal experts and public-health officials said.
“The expectation by those who stepped up and funded was that this would be the opening and that others would join,” said Sam Rivera, OnPoint NYC’s executive director.
Legislation to create safe-use sites has stalled in Illinois, Massachusetts and New Mexico. California’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in August vetoed a bill that would have allowed San Francisco, Oakland and Los Angeles to open free-use sites. He said sanctioning drug use could exacerbate drug problems in those cities.
But there is still interest in many communities. Rhode Island passed a bill backing free-use sites in 2021, and a group there has applied to open one this summer. “When people visit these sites, they see the profound impact you can have on people when you provide respect, healthcare and autonomy,” said Brandon Marshall, professor of epidemiology at the Brown University School of Public Health. Some community leaders in New York resisted OnPoint’s safe-use sites. Syderia Asberry, a founder of the nonprofit Greater Harlem Coalition, spent three years fighting against what she called the oversaturation of treatment centers and shelters in Harlem. She said safe-use sites represent an acceptance of drug use as a way of life.
“People are dying. We understand that. We don’t want people to die,” she said. “But is this really helping people?” Mr. Rivera said the sites keep people alive to try treatment when they are ready. “It’s a health intervention,” he said.
He said he would need $4.5 million a year to operate the sites around the clock.
OnPoint has received about $1 million to fund the sites from donors including the New York Community Trust and the New York Health Foundation.”
Sickpup831 t1_japmhr3 wrote
Honest question: how can they claim to have prevented seven hundred overdoses when the nyc overdose numbers are at an all time high? Are they saying that they have had 700 people use their services therefor preventing their deaths?
PandaJ108 t1_japodyl wrote
700 number refers to instances of somebody overdosing, in which it was reverse. It does not necessarily it prevented 700 people from overdosing. One person can be treated multiple time and each time a overdose was averted, it counts towards the 700 number.
Other articles have said these sites are essentially visited by the same 2,000 people throughout the year. With those people accounting for about 40,000 visits to these sites.
Sickpup831 t1_japoshp wrote
So 700 people have gone to the safe centers, overdosed, we’re given Narcan or life saving treatment and told “thank you, come back next time!” I don’t know, the whole situation seems fucked up. I don’t want these people dying out in the streets but there has to be some middle ground here.
retiredfromfire t1_jarkfyc wrote
I dont think there is a middle ground. Most think that "thank you, come again" somehow encourages drug use, but lets remember these people are drug addicts, they dont need encouragement, they've got all they need. If its lives you want to save than yes if you have to Narcan em every week thats what you do.
Or leave them to the streets.
HotChunkySoup t1_jappo27 wrote
> I don’t want these people dying out in the streets
Then they were successful: These people didn't die.
If you want people to die, make them do drugs in the streets. If you dont want them to die, provide harm reduction.
Longjumping_Vast_797 t1_jaqua8m wrote
No. If the chance of death from doing a hard drug is 10%, and someone does it once, ODs, then gets brought back with narcan, it's a saved life. If that person is going to continue taking the same exact chance of death over and over, it's the exact same chance of death each dose.
HotChunkySoup t1_jatr2y6 wrote
> If that person is going to continue taking the same exact chance of death over and over
>same exact chance
Please google what "harm reduction" is. Sterile equipment in a supervised site does not have the same odds of typical street use.
Sickpup831 t1_jarcyb3 wrote
So these are supposed to be safe injection sights right? What you’re telling me is that 700 times, a professional, pumped someone with enough drugs to kill them just to treat them and save their lives.
TheAJx t1_jasgr7f wrote
> If you want people to die, make them do drugs in the streets. If you dont want them to die, provide harm reduction.
You think these people stop doing drugs once they leave th epremises of these sites?
HotChunkySoup t1_jatqox9 wrote
They're not supposed to keep people from doing drugs. They're supposed to keep people from dying from doing drugs.
TheAJx t1_jatsknr wrote
>make them do drugs in the streets.
drpvn t1_japyno9 wrote
Nobody will ever audit these numbers.
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