The White House drug czar says it\u2019s critical to explore \u201cany and every option\u201d to reduce overdose deaths, and that could include allowing safe consumption sites for illegal substances if the evidence supports their efficacy.<\/p>\n
Top health officials have been promoting harm reduction in the Biden administration, but there\u2019s generally been a lack of specificity when it comes to safe injection sites where people can use currently illicit drugs in a medically supervised environment and get access to treatment resources.<\/p>\n
Rahul Gupta, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), previously said that he couldn\u2019t talk about the harm reduction centers due to ongoing litigation related to a Philadelphia nonprofit that faced a legal challenge after attempting to open such a facility. But in a new interview that aired on Wednesday with CNN\u2019s Sanjay Gupta\u2014the two men are not related\u2014he appeared more open to the possibility.<\/p>\n
The drug czar was asked<\/a> about the historic opening of the first two safe consumption sites<\/a> in New York City late last month and whether it\u2019s something he supports.<\/p>\n A record 100K+ deaths from drug overdoses in a one year period, much of it from fentanyl. I spoke with @POTUS<\/a>‘s new drug czar @DrGupta46<\/a> exclusively about how he plans to change that trajectory with a shift in thinking. Some of his ideas may surprise you. pic.twitter.com\/y8Vc3LBDY5<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Dr. Sanjay Gupta (@drsanjaygupta) December 9, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n \u201cI would be interested in looking at the science and data behind all of the emerging harm reduction practices,\u201d Gupta said. \u201cWe want to learn and we want to make sure that every possible door that we can open up to help people connect them to treatment is available to us.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf you\u2019re looking to save lives, and you\u2019ve reached a historic precedent levels of deaths, you cannot avoid looking at any and every option in order to save those lives.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n \u201cWe are seeing a crisis for which harm reduction is going to have to be one of the very important tools in our toolbox and for that very reason that this administration has made harm reduction for the first time part of its federal policy,\u201d Gupta, who previously played a key role in overseeing the implementation and expansion<\/a> of West Virginia\u2019s medical marijuana program and also worked for a major cannabis business last year<\/a>, said.<\/p>\n While still somewhat vague on the administration\u2019s specific policy on safe injection facilities, Gupta\u2019s comments signal an openness to the novel harm reduction intervention. And although it\u2019s only been a week since New York City\u2019s centers opened, it\u2019s notable that the Justice Department so far has not intervened.<\/p>\n Part of the reason the overdose prevention facilities are controversial in the U.S. is because a so-called federal \u201ccrack house statute\u201d makes it a felony to use a location for the manufacturing, distribution or consumption of controlled substances.<\/p>\n Under the Trump administration in 2019, DOJ sued to block the Philadelphia nonprofit, Safehouse, from opening its own safe injection site. In October, the Supreme Court rejected a request to hear a case<\/a>\u00a0on the legality of establishing the facilities.<\/p>\n Also on Wednesday, The Philadelphia Inquirer\u2019s Abraham Gutman also asked U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra about safe consumption facilities during a briefing on new federal harm reduction grants.<\/p>\n The official was asked about his prior support for the harm reduction centers and whether he\u2019s spoken with the Justice Department about issuing guidance on the topic. He replied that he \u201ccan\u2019t address your specific question at this time because of ongoing litigation.\u201d The Supreme Court declined to hear the case, but it is still being pursued in the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals.<\/p>\n Secretary Becerra told me on supervised injection sites: “I can’t address your specific question at this time because of ongoing litigation\u2026 The administration is also looking at ways to support research on the clinical effectiveness of emerging harm reduction practices.” pic.twitter.com\/rvqFg5FFCw<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Abraham Gutman (@abgutman) December 8, 2021<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n \u201cThe administration is also looking at ways to support research on the clinical effectiveness of emerging harm reduction practices, so we want to be able to see that in real world settings, as we\u2019ve noted in our first year drug policy priorities,\u201d Becerra said. \u201cI hope to be able to give more detail in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n He also said in prepared remarks<\/a> that, \u201cfor decades, our society tried to stigmatize and punish those with addiction\u2014but we know the so-called \u2018War on Drugs\u2019 was actually just a \u2018War on People.’\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cStigma doesn\u2019t save lives. Stigma induces silence, secrecy, and fear,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Becerra was among eight top state law enforcement officials who\u00a0filed\u00a0an amicus brief\u00a0in support of the Safehouse\u2019s safe injection site plan<\/a> when he served as California\u2019s attorney general. And he did recently signal in an earlier interview that the Biden administration would not move to block<\/a> the establishment safe injection sites, stressing that \u201cwe are literally trying to give users a lifeline\u201d\u2014though a department spokesperson later sought to walk back those remarks.<\/p>\n Gupta\u2019s comments on safe consumption facilities was all the more interesting considering that he\u2019s faced criticism from advocates over his harm reduction record<\/a>.<\/p>\n As commissioner for the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources Bureau for Public Health, he oversaw the decertification of a syringe access program that was designed to mitigate the spread of diseases like HIV and offer resources to people with substance misuse disorders.<\/p>\n As the national conversation around drug policy and substance misuse continues to evolve, support for harm reduction centers has expanded outside of traditional advocacy circles.<\/p>\n A coalition of 80 current and former prosecutors and law enforcement officials\u2014including one who is Biden\u2019s pick for U.S. attorney of Massachusetts\u2014also previously filed a brief urging the Supreme Court to\u00a0take up Safehouse\u2019s safe consumption case<\/a>.<\/p>\n While New York City is the first to open the harm reduction centers, the governor of Rhode Island did sign a historic bill in July to\u00a0establish a safe consumption site pilot program<\/a>.<\/p>\n Massachusetts lawmakers\u00a0advanced similar legislation last year<\/a>, but it was not ultimately enacted.<\/p>\n A similar harm reduction bill in California, sponsored by Sen. Scott Wiener (D), was approved in the state Senate in April, but further action has been delayed until 2022.<\/p>\n Kentucky Governor Wants To Let Farmers Sell Marijuana To Other States<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of Jernej Furman<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post White House Drug Czar Open To Safe Consumption Sites For Illegal Substances Amid Overdose Crisis<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The White House drug czar says it\u2019s critical to explore \u201cany and every option\u201d to reduce overdose deaths, and that could include allowing safe consumption sites for illegal substances if the evidence supports their efficacy. Top health officials have been promoting harm reduction in the Biden administration, but there\u2019s generallyContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81,126],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51637"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51637"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51637\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51638,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51637\/revisions\/51638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: White House Drug Czar Open To Safe Consumption Sites For Illegal Substances Amid Overdose Crisis<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"