London explores safe injection sites

"I can vividly remember picking up dirty needles off the ground to use because I needed to get high," said Dan.

According to reports, London was one of several Canadian cities exploring safe injection sites to minimise the spread of disease as well as encourage users to seek treatment.

Health Minister Jane Philpot called intravenous drug use a public emergency and offered full support and added that it was working with municipalities to ensure that the opening of safe injection sites was done right.

Toronto approved three injection sites earlier this summer, paving the way for other municipalities to do the same.

The safe injection sites could not only provide clean needles, but also allow interaction with staff which would help the addicts to become sober, sources said.

Public health officials had declared a public crisis in in the city of London earlier this year, said reports and continued that more than 2.5 million needles were being handed out each year in the city of about four hundred thousand. This made London second to Vancouver in numbers of public needle use, sources said.

According to reports, high rate of infection caused by needle use had resulted in forty- four new reported cases of HIV-AIDS in London this year, as contrasted to the decline of HIV rates in the rest of the province.

The process of opening of safe injection sites in London being slow, other harm-reduction approaches by public health organizations, such as delivering clean needles and injection kits as well as picking up dirty sharps, were already in place, reports said.

(Reporting by Asha Bajaj)