By Adam Donnelly

Interior Health presents plan for safe consumption sites to council

Jan 31, 2017 | 4:00 PM

KAMLOOPS — It was back in September of 2016 Kamloops Council first heard from Interior Health about safe consumption sites within the city. Today, representatives from IHA were back before council this to update councillors on the progress of the sites, and address any concerns they may have had.

With no sign of the public health emergency in response to the opioid crisis ending soon, representatives from Interior Health went before Kamloops city council today, to update mayor and council about plans for a pair of mobile safe consumption sites within the city.

“We’re still finalizing the various pieces of the application,” Rae Samson, from Interior Health said after today’s presentation to council. “Once we have those, then we’ll go forward.”

While members of city council recognize the severity of the opioid crisis, there were still questions about the exact nature of the role mobile safe consumption sites would play in IH’s harm reduction strategy.

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Samson says interior health hopes to submit their application for the sites to Health Canada within the next few weeks, but would like city hall’s approval before they move ahead

“we’re asking for a letter of opinion from the city,” Samson explained, adding “I think as we heard today, they’re very happy to participate in that, and I feel we’ve answered a lot of their concerns.”

For now, it’s a longer wait for harm reduction sites, and a hope we don’t add any more names to the 40 who died of drug overdoses in Kamloops in 2016.