What the Health Unit is Doing | What Parents Can Do
|
Youth know what the issues are and they have ideas on what needs to be put in place to resolve them. Our role is to ask, listen and support their actions for solutions. |
Superior Points Harm Reduction Program
Superior Points Harm Reduction Program works in cooperation with other community agencies, such as Shelter House Thunder Bay, to provide harm reduction services to a wide range of high-risk individuals, including both street-involved and intravenous drug users.
Statistical and “word of mouth” information collected by Superior Points indicates that the number of youth aged 24 years and under living on the streets of Thunder Bay is increasing and that drug use among this population is prevalent.
Superior Points is a street-based program, which works with injection drug users, sex trade workers, and anyone involved in high risk behaviours. The services provided are:
-
Needle exchange
-
Distribution and recovery of safe injections supplies
-
HIV/AIDS and HCV (Hepatitis C Virus) education
-
Harm reduction education
-
Counselling and referrals
-
Condom distribution
-
Community and agency presentations
Superior Points has been in operation for almost eleven years. There are three outreach workers with many years experience. The numbers of needles distributed and recovered are increasing every year. View the Graph (PDF document) Needles Distributed & Recovered for more details.
The Superior Points Program uses “Harm Reduction” to do its work. Workers do not try to convince people to stop using drugs.
|
What is Harm Reduction?
Harm reduction is a way of reducing the drug-related harm on people and communities. Some of the principles of harm reduction are:
-
To reduce drug-related harm rather than focusing on reducing drug-use
-
To offer people who continue to use drugs useful help and strategies to stay or become healthier.
-
To help ensure that drug users are treated with dignity and that they are seen as full members of society. This is done by ensuring that they are not judged or punished for taking alcohol and drugs.
-
To focus on realistic and achievable goals. (Erickson et al, 1997; Lenton and Single, 1998)
-
To keep communities safe and clean by making sure used injection equipment is discarded safely.
By following these steps, programs are set up to reduce some of the health and social problems as well as financial costs resulting from drug use. This can be done even when people use drugs. |
Street Level Sex Trade
Street level sex trade has gone up in recent years. Police have listed over 60 women that work in the downtown south core. They also say that sex trade workers are younger. In the past, Superior Points has seen sex trade workers that range in age from mid to late twenties. Now many are in their late teens and early twenties. Some girls in the sex trade are even in their early teens.
Thunder Bay Street Youth Drug Use Questionnaire
In March-April, 2005, Thunder Bay’s street youth were surveyed about drug use. Five “street-involved youth” were hired to interview their peers. They looked for drug-using, homeless and street-involved youth from 16 to 24 years old. Some key findings of the survey were:
-
The main drug the street-involved youth choose to use is cocaine/crack (30%). This is followed by marijuana (27%); opiates, including OxyContin, morphine, Percocet, codeine, and heroin (18%); ecstasy (6%); methamphetamine (crystal meth) (4%); and magic mushrooms (4%).
-
Because of cost and what can be found on the streets, people cannot always use their drug of choice. So drugs that the surveyed youth use most often are different than their drug of choice. Most often, they used marijuana (44%), opiates (including Percocet, morphine, OxyContin and codeine) (17%), methamphetamine (crystal meth) (10%), Ritalin (6%), cocaine/crack (6%) and alcohol (6%).
-
The survey asked the youth to list all of the drugs they had tried at least once in the past six months. They listed 47 different drugs. In the past 6 months, 85% used marijuana, 68% used cocaine and/or crack, 52% used prescription opiates (OxyContin, codeine, fentanyl, morphine, Percocet, Dilaudid), 25% used methamphetamine and 21% used ecstasy.
-
30% of the respondents admitted to having injected drugs.
-
75% have shared “works” (anything used to take drugs, such as pipes, straws, needles and other things) at some point in the past and 61% share works now. These works can pass on blood or a virus.
-
Respondents admitted to sharing many different kinds of works. The top shared works listed were pipes (52%), bills and straws (29%), joints (24%), and needles (20%).
-
Even though Thunder Bay has the most active needle exchange program in Ontario, 66% said they shared to save money. They also said it was not easy to get clean works. 27% of those sharing said they share because they feel uneasy insisting on clean works. This shows that taking drugs is seen as intimate and something done together. Many youth surveyed did not know that non-needle works like pipes, straws, and bills also should not be shared.
The survey results stress the need for harm reduction work in this hard to reach population. More harm reduction strategies for youth are necessary. It is important to continue to distribute sterile works including injection supplies.
Drug users of all ages need to be able to get clean works easily. Even if that happens, youth might still not feel comfortable asking for them. Continued teaching about how to use works safely and how using dirty works spreads infection and disease is important.
Back to Top
The goal of the Health Unit is to promote health for all. Helping youth get and stay healthy is being done by challenging them to take practical steps towards that goal and to become responsible for their own well being. The Thunder Bay District Health Unit is working with youth toward good health.
Learn more about the Health Unit's Superior Points Needle Exchange Program at: http://www.tbdhu.com/ID/NeedleExchange/
Back to Top
Our community can help keep all of our youth healthy. But we need to work together to change the image of youth. Youth need to be seen as a valuable resource with many strengths, instead of as a problem group needing to be managed and controlled. To empower youth, we need them to tell us what they need, and find solutions together. This works much better than using adult solutions that ignore youth’s wisdom and realities.
Back to Top