Court decision halting Dublin injecting centre 'a real setback' for Cork
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The chairwoman of the Cork Local Drugs and Alcohol Task Force (CLDATF) has said public drug injecting “has not gone away” despite a court ruling halting long-awaited plans for a safer injecting facility in Dublin.
Colette Kelleher said it was a “real setback” for Cork too as the local task force campaigned for a similar facility in the city.
Her comments follow the decision of the High Court on Thursday to overturn a decision by An Bord Pleanála granting planning permission for the country’s first medically supervised injecting centre in the premises of Merchants Quay Ireland (MQI) in Dublin city.
MQI's premises is just 150 metres from St Audeon's Primary School, which brought the High Court challenge.
The school claimed the facility would worsen problems, including drug users congregating in the area, engaging in drug buying and selling, overdosing, and other anti-social behaviour.
The court said the planning authority failed to explain why it granted temporary permission for three years when its own inspector recommended two years.
The court also said the board failed to address the school's objections.
“I’m very disappointed with the decision,” said Ms Kelleher. “Just because the decision has been made doesn’t mean the issues facing people with addictions is no longer there."
She said many people street injecting also have health issues, mental health issues, a history of State care and broken families, and suffered domestic abuse and sexual assault.
“You are talking about very vulnerable, very sick people who die young — people who’ve been through the mill already,” she said.
Ms Kelleher said public injecting is not what people want to see and that part of the response was a safe place to inject, providing other health advice and support.
She said staff, parents and kids at St Audeon’s may be seeing drug use day in, day out — but said that won’t change with the planned centre rejected.
“Schoolchildren will continue to see people in those states, continue to see people in alleys and doorways, around and near the school and other schools,” she said.
Ms Kelleher said it’s a “real setback” for Cork, adding that the CLDATF made calls for such a centre back in 2015, following the government’s decision to pilot one in Dublin.
The call was made at the time on the back on information — gathered from the city’s needle exchange worker over the previous eight months — which showed an increase in dangerous injecting practices, including a rise in groin injections, intravenous drug users preparing their hits in unsafe environments, including in squats, churches, grounds of churches, apartment complex and car park stairwells, parks, and on public steps.
The CLDATF said at the time that if communities, cities, and counties are to be effective in addressing problems associated with illicit drug use, there is a need to follow the best available evidence.
“This means responding to drug use with localised, targeted, and inclusive interventions, which match the particular patterns of drug use in an area,” it said.
“It is well recognised that Ireland, and Irish cities in particular, have significant numbers of people who consume drugs by way of injection, many of whom are isolated from mainstream healthcare and service delivery.
“Medically Supervised Injecting Centres (MSICs) are interventions backed by a strong evidence base which can be effective in reaching this group.
“MSICs have been shown to improve both health-related indicators for drug users and broader environmental indicators such as the reduction of unsafely discarded paraphernalia.”
The group said they are not a panacea and in order to be effective, they need to be properly integrated into mainstream service delivery.
Earlier this month, Cork’s Lord Mayor Cllr Colm Kelleher spoke publicly for the first time about his brother, Don’s, recovery from heroin addiction and said Ireland needs to start talking about supervised injection rooms and needle exchange programmes as part of the solution to the heroin problem.
"If we expect people with drug, alcohol or gambling problems to accept they have a problem and seek help, then society needs to be mature enough to have a conversation about the solutions,” Mr Kelleher said.
He said the court decision in relation to the Dublin centre doesn’t mean such a facility is now “off the agenda” in Cork and that they would continue to argue for it.