Thunder Bay's only safe drug consumption site to close in wake of Ontario move, raising fears of more deaths
Path 525 among 10 closures as province bans sites near schools, child-care centres
Advocates in Thunder Bay say the Ontario government's move to close a number of safe consumption sites (SCS) will be detrimental to people living with addictions.
Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced Tuesday the province is banning the sites within 200 metres of schools and child-care centres, meaning 10 locations in the province, including Path 525 in Thunder Bay, must shut down by March 31, 2025.
Path 525, which is operated by NorWest Community Health Centres (NWCHC), is on the city's south side, around the corner from Ogden Community Public School.
Opened in 2018, the service's clients can bring in drugs from the street to use in the presence of a registered nurse, who can help them if they overdose.
"A couple of times that I've been there, I've overdosed," said Vanessa Tookenay, a member of Fort William First Nation. Tookenay has has been in recovery from addiction for about 2½ years and is now a child and youth worker.
"Had I not been there, I wouldn't be alive."
The province says it's spending $378 million on 19 new Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) Hubs, and is encouraging SCS operators to apply to transition to the hub model.
"With a focus on treatment and recovery, HART Hubs will not offer 'safer' supply, supervised drug consumption or needle exchange programs," according to the government's news release Tuesday.
Supervised consumption sites receive provincial funding, with an exemption under the federal Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. Last summer, Ontario launched a "critical incident review" of all safe consumption sites following a fatal shooting of a woman near one in Toronto.
Last year, Thunder Bay had the highest opioid toxicity mortality rate in the province compared to all other public health units, according to the Office of the Chief Coroner (OCC). At least 16 people died in the city in the first quarter of 2024, according to the OCC's latest data.
"These places literally keep people alive, and I just really can't get over how many people are not going to make it as a result of it closing," Tookenay said of Path 525.
NWCHC was not immediately available for comment following the province's announcement Tuesday afternoon. However, earlier in the day, it issued a drug alert warning people that a substance being sold as turquoise fentanyl was found to contain rat poison and multiple clients have been hospitalized.
People 'treated like humans' at Path 525
Path 525 offers clients access to harm reduction supplies, a safer supply program and a drug testing machine. Harm reduction workers and nurses connect people to other community resources, including primary care, housing, mental health and addiction support.
"There's a shower where they can clean up, they get to essentially debrief from what's going on in their lives, they get to be treated, and have a human conversation and do something that resembles a sense of normalcy," said Tookenay.
Tookenay has experience as a peer support worker helping others with addiction and mental health challenges. She said people who don't have first-hand experience may not understand the purpose of SCS, but those who use these spaces often have nowhere else to go.
I just really can't get over how many people are not going to make it as a result of it closing.- Vanessa Tookenay, child and youth worker
"It's a place to get support for safety, for connection. It's a sense of security," she said. "Maybe it doesn't make sense to someone who doesn't live that way, but we're really giving them the opportunity to live day to day."
Lise Vaugeois, MPP for Thunder Bay-Superior North, issued a statement Tuesday about the closure of Path 525.
"This site offers wrap-around services and has saved countless lives. I'm shocked that the Ford government is shutting down an essential service that is working so well," Vaugeois said. "The minister of health is taking away a key tool in our fight to save lives and putting stigma ahead of support."
Feared around 'prohibitionist model'
The province says SCS operators could be eligible for up to four times more funding under the HART Hubs model than what they currently receive. While communities losing their SCS are not guaranteed to get a HART Hub, they will be prioritized in the application process.
Premier Doug Ford was in Thunder Bay earlier this month. When asked about safe consumption services, Ford admitted he has not been to an SCS himself.
Holly Gauvin, executive director of Elevate NWO, a harm reduction agency in Thunder Bay, said her team of outreach workers was "crushed" to hear about Path 525's upcoming closure.
"Just to see more erosion happening around our fragile health-care system here in Thunder Bay is really, really devastating," Gauvin said.
Her fear is a "prohibitionist" model around drug consumption will steer people away from accessing services.
"I do think that it's going to continue to drive [drug] use underground," she said. "There's going to be more and more risk taking, which means there will be more and more fatalities, but there [will] also be more and more infectious diseases spread through this as well."
Rather than scaling back harm reduction services, Gauvin said, there needs to be more investments in a slate of addiction supports.
Most urgently, though, she wants to see provincial partners meet with NWCHC and other front-line organizations in Thunder Bay to properly discuss the future of safe consumption services and whether an arrangement can be made to keep Path 525 and relocate it elsewhere.
Tookenay wants Path 525 stay open, with more drop-in spaces throughout the city and more mobile services where outreach workers can meet people where they're at.
Her message for those experiencing addiction is recovery is possible.
"I thought drugs would kill me, and I thought that I would never have a relationship or I would never have a home, I would never be a productive member of society — and all those things have happened as a result of me just taking a little leap of faith," she said.
"Trusting in the process and reaching out, and just being humble enough to know, 'I don't know how to do this by myself, but there are people who are willing to help me.'"
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