I’ve used a Toronto supervised consumption site for a year. What it’s really like in these facilities Doug Ford is bent on shuttering

Posted on September 4, 2024 in Health Debates

Source: — Authors:

TheStar.com – Opinion/Contributors
Sept. 2, 2024.   By Kevin Wilson, Contributor

The Ford government announced plans to close most supervised consumption sites in Ontario, the very places that have changed my life, writes Kevin Wilson.

Imagine learning that someone you deeply care for has suddenly died, and their death was entirely preventable. It’s a feeling most addicts have come to know well, especially in the past decade as the street drug supply has grown ever more toxic and lethal. The shock, and the grief and the rage?

That’s pretty much exactly how I felt when I learned that our Premier and his Minister of Health planned to close the Queen West supervised consumption site, along with four other sites in Toronto and another five across Ontario.

I’m not nearly the voracious consumer of news I once was. Addiction and homelessness have a way of doing that to a person, but by some strange coincidence, I decided to have a peek at Google News just a few hours after the Ford government’s recent announcement.

The news was horrifying, but not a complete surprise. In recent months, conservative politicians at all levels of government across Canada, have been using increasingly bellicose rhetoric to attack the harm reduction model of addressing substance use.

Supervised consumption sites (SCS) are perhaps the most visible manifestation of harm reduction. These sites provide a safe environment, sterile tools and are staffed by health care professionals and trained harm reduction workers, for people to use drugs with less risk.

Taken together, the impending closure of all ten sites is a gut punch, but the Queen West SCS has particular personal resonance. I was buzzed through its doors — the first time I had ever availed myself of an SCS — about a year ago.

That first visit marked the beginning of my long and as-yet unfinished climb out of the unbearably dark pit I occupied. For years, I had struggled alone, not just with my addiction, but with a host of other demons including, but not limited to, burnout, mental illness and self-loathing. None of that mattered inside the SCS.

I felt welcomed and valued from the moment I stepped inside. I slowly opened up to one worker, Josh. We bonded during one of his breaks over crossword puzzles. He’s since moved to another role with another agency, but another harm reduction worker who remains in contact with him told me he asks about me often.

I kept coming back, and since that first visit, a transformation has taken hold. Words like “addict,” “homeless,” and “crazy” are no longer words that define me. Rather, they have become words that serve to help inform who I have become, in the here and now. But I am so much more than just those three words. I am a parent, friend, daredevil, raconteur and despite my best efforts to not be, I am also an activist, apparently.

Whatever doubt I may have had about my activism went out the window days ago, courtesy of Doug Ford and Sylvia Jones, and for good reason.

The Queen West site provided me with more than a place to safely use drugs. The staff provided medical attention when I needed it, food and snacks when I was hungry, water and juice when I was thirsty, a sympathetic ear and a hug when I despaired.

Through them, I was connected with a phenomenal support worker from Parkdale Queen West Community Health Centre (PQWCHC), which operates the Queen West SCS. They has been my advocate and biggest supporter. With their help, obstacles that seemed insurmountable have vanished.

After I suffered a badly broken arm and required surgery, that worker and their colleagues were able to secure a respite care bed where I could convalesce.

When it was time for me to be discharged, staff from the respite care facility and PQWCHC found me a shelter bed. Now, for the first time in what seems like an eternity, I see a path opening to stable, secure housing.

Along the way, my drug use has fallen dramatically. Apparently, that’s a thing that happens when despair gets replaced with hope. I can’t say I’ve escaped that dark pit, but I no longer feel like I’m sinking.

Instead of quicksand threatening to engulf me, I feel like I have enough of a toehold, along with the outstretched arms of people like Josh and my support worker, to finally climb out.

None of these things would ever have happened in a place our Premier all but labelled a drug den in his announcements. The house where his brother, then-mayor Rob Ford was filmed smoking crack? That was a drug den.

Doug Ford of all people should know the difference.

Kevin Wilson is a recovering journalist, father, daredevil, raconteur, and reluctant activist.

https://www.thestar.com/opinion/contributors/ive-used-a-toronto-supervised-consumption-site-for-a-year-what-its-really-like-in/article_89989556-655f-11ef-9414-f3ad728edfa5.html

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One Response to “I’ve used a Toronto supervised consumption site for a year. What it’s really like in these facilities Doug Ford is bent on shuttering”

  1. Bryn Davis says:
    December 11, 2024 at 11:12 pm

    I think that Kevin Wilson has every right to be angry about the closure of safe consumption sites across Ontario. As a recovered drug addict, I can understand his fear that more and more people will die due to overdose. When he talks about the feeling that most addicts have come to know well, when a loved one dies, and their death was entirely preventable. It’s a sense of hopelessness that can’t be helped. The only thing that the people of Ontario can do is to keep talking about addiction and safe consumption sites. If people keep talking about it, it will slowly chip away at the stigma surrounding the issue. People who use drugs deserve a place that can save their lives, addiction is a disease. Many people don’t believe that to be true, but it is a sickness that has a cure. Safe consumption sites offer other social services that are immensely beneficial to addicts. They can have the option to get better. The Ontario government damned hundreds of people when they decided to close safe consumption sites.

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