.png)
6 hours ago
1
The UK’s first legal drug consumption room, the Thistle, will open its doors in the East End of Glasgow on Monday morning after a 10-year battle to realise the pioneering facility.
The Thistle will remain open 365 days a year from 9am to 9pm and allow some of the most vulnerable addicts in the city to take their own drugs in a clean and safe environment under the supervision of health professionals.
Such is the level of cross-UK interest that Glasgow city council is coordinating a network of interested cities to lobby the Westminster government for a legislative change that could allow further pilot schemes.
But this potentially transformative moment in UK drugs policy takes place with Scotland’s drug deaths still the worst per capita in Europe, the equivalent of three Scots dying every day. It emerged last week that more than 1,500 drug-addicted babies had been born in recent years, adding to widespread anger at the Scottish government’s continuing failure to arrest this trend, with underfunding of residential rehabilitation and wraparound care to support people getting into medically assisted treatment.
It is “very important” that the facility is not regarded as a silver bullet for the drug death crisis that continues to grip the city and the country, said Dr Saket Priyadarshi, the associate medical director of Glasgow alcohol and drug recovery services. “It’s another part of a system of care, another piece of the jigsaw responding to a very complex problem.”
But he also hit back at critics who favour abstinence-based recovery over harm reduction, and have questioned the merits of spending on a facility that will cater for a few hundred addicts when funding is so constrained elsewhere.
“I don’t see why we shouldn’t be spending money on a group with some of the highest mortality of any population in Scotland. If I was the clinical lead for an oncology service I wouldn’t be asked those questions. I don’t know why I am as clinical lead for drug services, when we’re all saying that the drug death crisis is a national shame.”
“All eyes are on Glasgow,” acknowledged Allan Casey, the city council’s addictions convener, with “a huge amount of pressure to make sure we get it right”.
“We know across the world that safe consumption makes a difference, but we need to demonstrate that it works within the confines of the UK, and indeed, the Misuse of Drugs Act,” he added.
With drug laws reserved to Westminster, the previous Conservative government repeatedly dismissed calls from Glasgow city council, backed by the Scottish government, for the legal powers to pilot such a scheme, which was first proposed 10 years ago after a HIV epidemic among street addicts drew attention to the cold, dark and dangerous corners of the East End, not so far from the Thistle, where street users injected their drugs.
The go-ahead was finally given for this three-year pilot after Scotland’s most senior law officer confirmed users would not be prosecuted.
An individual wanting to make use of theThistle does not have to give their full name at the reception desk. A member of staff will have a brief discussion with them about what drugs they are taking and how they plan to use them before taking them through to a bright open-plan room of eight injecting booths with tilted mirrors so that nurses can keep an eye on users without encroaching on their privacy.
In the lounge area, where people can relax afterwards, the creamy walls, deep armchairs and double-sided bookcases stacked with novels, puzzles and mindfulness colouring books are reminiscent of an upmarket wellbeing retreat. Almost every element of the Thistle has also been informed by an advisory group of former addicts, who dictated the need for shower and laundry facilities, as well as a covered outdoor tobacco smoking area.
“If you’re going to engage the population we’re trying to reach, this service has to be really different,” explained Priyadarshi. “They have often had difficult experiences with conventional health services, so that includes everything from the way the staff greet them at the door, the language we use – the meeting room is now called the chat room, the treatment room is called the health room – the fact staff won’t wear NHS uniforms.”
The supervision at the Thistle is deliberately light-touch, informed by the experience of the enhanced drug treatment facility, which provides addicts with pharmaceutical-grade heroin, out of the same health centre. But staff also hope to engage drug users who have proved hardest to reach, with support for wider healthcare, housing and benefits also available.
“The key to this service will be the relationships we build,” says the Thistle’s service manager, Lynn Macdonald. “Our job is that people feel safe and trust us.”
