Province tells doctors it has no plans to fund supervised consumption sites in Sask.

The province says it has no plans to give money to supervised safe consumption sites.

The Saskatchewan Medical Association (SMA) passed a resolution in 2021 endorsing funding the sites. Prairie Harm Reduction (PHR) in Saskatoon has asked unsuccessfully for government funding for its safe consumption site for the past four years. PHR does receive some funding for other programming, but the province has been vocal about not wanting to fund safe consumption.

On Friday, Mental Health and Addictions Minister Tim McLeod spoke at the SMA fall assembly in Saskatoon.

"The community-based organizations that are offering those services can continue to do so. The government is not interested in providing funding for consumption sites," he said to reporters.

"We believe the approach that we are taking is the better approach."

The government is providing a "broad spectrum of services" to help people with addictions, and the overall focus is on treatment and recovery, he said. 

That involves addictions medicines that can be prescribed, he said. Making naloxone kits and expanding overdose outreach teams is also part of the government's plan.

This approach does not sit well with Benjamin Leis, an internal medicine physician in Saskatoon.

"The science tells us, and the evidence that has studied places that are safe consumption sites, is that they reduce mortality in the sense that they provide a safe place for patients to inject, if they feel the need to inject drugs or use drugs," he said.

"Because it's supervised, we can intervene if they overdose. And we're constantly engaged attempting to help them with their addiction."

The SMA passed resolutions in 2020 and 2021 asking the government to fund the sites.

In 2021, Saskatoon doctor Carla Holinaty said something needed to be done in the face the opioid crisis that continues to claim hundreds of lives each year.

"We can put a ton of money into recovery and detox and things like that, but we lose many people to overdose deaths before they even have a chance to enter into that program," said Holinaty.

"They're not ready to go into those pathways yet. We still have an obligation to do our best to at the very least keep them alive."