After opening up sites in Canada years ago, Safe Consumption Sites, or safe injection sites, in the U.S. have had a rocky road towards ribbon cutting.
There have been numerous proposals for openings across the country, and all have been met with intense opposition by neighboring residents and politicians in the states. As of now, not a single site is open legally, although there is at least one operating underground, showing some positive results.
In 2019, a study was conducted in Canada that found that a person suffering from drug addiction who used a site at least weekly had a reduced risk of death over those who went more infrequently or not at all.
Which brings us to Philadelphia, where a safe injection site has been proposed for years by a non-profit named Safehouse. Last year, things were looking good before that intense opposition (linked above) brought Trump into the fold and successfully blocked the opening through a federal court.
Last week, Safehouse fought back again. They have filed a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court asking for them to take up their case.
Safe Injection Sites are a complex and still niche prospect, so the idea of a rather right-leaning Supreme Court voting in its favor is pretty unlikely. If the court does end up taking on the case, their decision could affect the ability for these sites to open up for years to come afterwards. There is lots of risk in taking this to the top like Safehouse is doing.
A decision by the court to take up this case should be coming soon, so we’ll be following this story closely.
