Scotland is set to open the UK’s first drug consumption room (DCR) after authorities in Glasgow approved the scheme. The move is part of efforts to combat the country’s drug death crisis. DCRs provide clean and sterile equipment in a safe, private environment for users to inject drugs. The facilities also offer support services and medics trained in combating overdose. Over 100 such facilities are running in 17 countries worldwide. Denmark has had them for a decade, and Australia over 20 years.
Drug reform activist Peter Krykant has been a leading voice for DCRs and is campaigning for them in cities across Scotland and the UK. Krykant set up a mobile, unsanctioned “overdose prevention service” in Glasgow last year, run initially out of a converted minibus and later an old ambulance. Over the course of 10 months, his service oversaw almost 900 injections and intervened in nine potentially fatal overdoses.
The deployment of the DCR as a pilot program at an existing health centre comes after a recent fresh look at the 52-year-old Misuse of Drugs Act in the country, which criminalises drug possession. Scotland’s chief law officer has stated that it would not be in the public interest to prosecute those using DCRs. Fresh political impetus led to the site being identified with draft plans drawn up.
Some critics of such facilities argue that these sites encourage drug use and introduce crime to surrounding communities. The Scottish government, however, argues
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