Why Alternatives Matter
Many people like the idea of harm reduction in theory, but still feel a little wary about it in practice. We often hear, “I get the whole needle exchange thing, but WHY PIPES? WHY FOIL?!” We hope this helps answer some of your questions.
Offering alternatives offers choice! Many people report that they use what is available, so if syringes are the only thing provided, a person will take the riskier option to inject. Offering various--safer--ways to use drugs allows autonomy, choice and the opportunity to choose less risky ways of consuming drugs. One person told us, “Since you guys starting offering glass (pipes), I switched from shooting (injecting) to smoking a few months ago and have started methadone and cut back my use significantly.” To us, this is huge win, and the type of feedback we love to hear, and all the more reason offering alternatives matters.
It builds trust toward future care. A study conducted by NIH highlighted that safe syringe programs who offered smoking supplies have more encounters overall. In our experience, these encounters can lead to candid conversations and discussions about health, eventually building enough trust with our team to discuss other things like medical needs, housing goals etc.
It’s what people want and ask for! People we support specifically asked us to provide injection alternatives. While some people still opt to get syringes from us, we have found that since offering alternatives, people prefer the alternatives to syringes for the most part. To meet the specific needs of the people we support, we offer many alternatives to injection! Our team offers four different smoking options, snort kits and boof kits.
It creates more positive health outcomes overall. Less injection means less soft tissue infections (like abscesses), less risk of endocarditis and lowers the spread of blood borne infections such as HIV and Hepatitis C in our community.
It decreases the risk of overdose. Injection offers a faster onset of a drug directly into the bloodstream. With smoking, drugs get into the system slower and quanitity can be managed easier. Rather than having to find veins and inject multiple times for a fast-acting drug such as fentanyl, a person can instead take multiple hits off a pipe, causing less harm overall.
It decreases stigma. Having a variety of supplies means we cast a wide net to support people regardless of what drug they use and how the use it. Sometimes, people are shamed for using one drug vs. others. (beyond just being shamed in general for being a person who uses drugs!)
It’s harm reduction!!! Our team isn’t here to judge or tell people to not use drugs. The fact is, people will and do choose to use drugs for a variety of reasons. As a healthcare team, our goal is to support people wherever they are in life with their health needs/goals and to support people in finding ways to reduce harm if they do choose to use drugs.
We don’t care what drug you use, we just want you to do so safely! We are always happy to talk to people about alternatives to injection and walk through each item we offer.