The Windsor Essex County Health Unit is providing a snapshot of a recent survey on a safe injection site (SIS).
2,500 people responded to the survey launched in October aimed at figuring out what people in the community think about the possibility of a SIS in the community.
Health Unit CEO Theresa Marenette says 61% of people who took the voluntary survey are in favour of a safe injection site while 39% are opposed.
She says the 80-page report also includes interviews with 99 persons who inject drugs (PWID) who overall, say they are looking for more support.
"With mental health services, primary care, social services, so that is something that people who inject drugs would like to see - is a referral source from a safe injection site or a consumption and treatment service," says Marentette.
She calls the data "raw" and says it's about meeting the needs of a handful of specific people.
Results of a recent survey on a safe injection site in Windsor-Essex were presented at the WECHU Board of Directors meeting on July 18, 2019. (Kristylee Varley/AM800 News
"This site would be for those people that would come out so we certainly want to meet their needs and we want to make sure that we're addressing what they see as a priority in their lives. It's not really about those that aren't going to access the site, it's about those that will."
Marentette says part of the opposition from the community might simply be a lack of understanding.
"Maybe just the lack of information about what people are going through that would actually access this site," she says. "Some people don't have supports that others do and so it's a lack of understanding of what people need who would access a safe injection site."
The full report will be presented to the health unit's board of directors at the September meeting.
The health unit reported in October that this area is facing increased illness and deaths related to the use of opioids and other drugs.
Drug-related overdoses, as reported by EMS, increased from 505 in 2016 to 783 in 2017.