This evidence brief is in response to the request for written comments by the Office of Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Controlled Substances Directorate, Controlled Substances and Cannabis Branch, Health Canada on the development of these new regulations for supervised consumption services.
The data presented is from Sex Now, the Community-Based Research Centre’s (CBRC) principal community-based research initiative and Canada’s largest and longest running survey of gay, bisexual, trans and queer men’s and Two-Spirit and non-binary people’s (GBT2Q) health. In the recent Sex Now 2019 survey, conducted online prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, over 11,000 GBT2Q people shared their experiences about a variety of topics, addressing two of the three questions posed by Health Canada:
- What are the impacts of supervised consumption sites or services on people who use drugs, the communities in which these services are located, and the provinces and territories? -
- What types of supervised consumption services (e.g. drug checking, peer assistance, medication-assisted treatment and safer-supply treatment options) should be included under the proposed new regulations? What evidence exists to support the effectiveness of such services?