Medically supervised injecting centres are “legally sanctioned and supervised facilities designed to reduce the health and public order problems associated with illegal injection drug use.”1 Their purpose is to enable the consumption of pre-obtained drugs under hygienic, low risk conditions (box).1 They differ from illegal “shooting galleries,” where users pay to inject on site.2 Worldwide, medically supervised injecting centres (also referred to as health rooms, supervised injecting rooms, drug consumption rooms, and safer injecting rooms or facilities) are receiving renewed attention. In 2001, the first medically supervised injecting centre in recent times was opened in Sydney, Australia. By 2002, there were 16 centres in five German cities,3 over 20 in the Netherlands, and some in Switzerland and Spain.4

The UK Home Affairs Select Committee recently recommended “that an evaluated pilot programme of safe injecting houses for heroin users is established without delay and that if this is successful, the programme is extended across the country.”5 However, the Home Secretary rejected this recommendation, stating that medically supervised injecting centres would be supported only as part of a heroin prescribing programme.5 We argue that this decision should be overturned.

Supervised injecting centres enable the use of pre-obtained drugs under hygenic, low risk conditions

Credit: SHANEY BALCOMBE/NEWSPIX