OVERDOSE PREVENTION SITES SAVE LIVES
What are overdose prevention sites?
Overdose prevention sites (OPS) are safe, private facilities that provide people who use drugs a place for consumption and life-saving interventions, like naloxone and access to treatment services. OPS are a proven solution to the overdose crisis that has taken countless lives and destroyed communities.
More than 150 OPS exist in 12 countries around the world – many of which have been operating for decades. OPS meet people where they are, providing community support in their journey toward access to care.
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OPS Save Lives
Every day in 2019, nearly seven Marylanders died from an opioid overdose – and COVID-19 has led to even more fatal overdoses. OPS can help change these horrifying statistics. At a single OPS in Canada, overdose fatality dropped 35% in the area around the site within its first year of operation.
OPS Create Safer Communities
When someone visits an OPS, they check in with a staff member about their physical and mental health and discuss their intended substance use. The consumption area offers visitors new syringes, a clean preparation area, and fentanyl test strips. These resources help reduce the risk of HIV and Hepatitis C and fatal overdoses.
OPS can also help visitors connect with treatment services. Over three years, one OPS helped 67% of participants begin treatment.
What Can You Do to Promote Harm Reduction?
Harm reduction is an approach to community health and safety that helps people be safer and makes institutions less harmful. Harm reduction encourages us to help our communities be safer when engaging in culturally stigmatized behaviors, like drug use or sex.
To promote harm reduction, we can:
Change our routines to be more responsive, supportive and aware of other people around us.
Share suggestions with family and friends for how to incorporate harm reduction practices into our everyday lives.
Gather and distribute tools and resources to increase yours and others’ safety.
Institutions and organizations can:
Change harmful and stigmatizing policies and systems.
Support the safety of ALL individuals.
Decrease violence and marginalization towards community and staff members.
Contact Us
admin@bridges4ops.org