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Michael Baker has been a client at Path 525, the only safe drug consumption facility in Thunder Bay, Ontario, for years. He says the staff there has saved his life more than a dozen times.
Baker also volunteers at the site and says he has, in turn, saved the lives of about a dozen people who had overdosed by using naloxone kits provided by Path 525.
The news this week that Path 525, along with nine other safe consumption sites in the province, will close next year has devastated him.
“It’s not just a place [for] safe injection. It’s not just a place to get high. It’s the hub, I think, of Thunder Bay’s harm reduction network,” said Baker, who has been homeless for several years and lives in a tent.
“It’s a place where you get referrals to other programs.”
Path 525, operated by NorWest Community Health Centres (NWCHC), opened in 2018. This past summer, Ontario launched a “critical incident assessment” of all safe consumption locations following a deadly shooting that left a woman dead near a shooting in Toronto.
NorWest Executive Director Juanita Lawson said the province never shared the results of Path 525’s investigation with her team.
“Last fall, we as an organization conducted a comprehensive audit of community safety and are in the process of implementing a number of the required, requested or recommended changes,” Lawson said.
Ontario’s decision to close 10 supervised drug use sites has sparked outrage, with documents showing the closures fly in the face of advice from the province’s own experts.
Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced Tuesday that the province is banning SCS within 200 meters of schools and daycare centerswhich will force five schools in Toronto and five other cities to close their doors by March 31, 2025. Path 525 is just around the corner from Ogden Community Public School.
The news has been met with much criticism as documents show the closures go against the advice of the provincial experts.
Lawson says she’s disappointed that the services her team has provided for years, and the clients who rely on them, are “really being stigmatized.”
“We know there is a lot of pressure on the community, but we also know that the consumption and treatment services are not the cause of the illnesses that are happening,” she said.
Hundreds of overdoses reversed
According to Lawson, employees have reversed 365 overdoses at Path 525 between 2021 and the first half of 2024.
Last month, there were 1,266 visits from people who needed access to food, showers, housing support and supplies. A total of 318 people went for safe drug use and 135 people received primary health care, she said.
“There’s a school across the street, which is unfortunate, but the drugs [were] “This has been done here since before the facility opened,” Baker said.
CBC News reached out to the health minister’s office for comment on whether it had consulted with the NWCHC about the Path 525 closure or its review. Alexandra Adamo, Jones’ executive director of communications, did not directly answer those questions.
“The crime figures speak for themselves. In Thunder Bay, the neighbourhood with the CTS (consumption and treatment services) location that is being considered for closure is [has] “There has been a definite increase in crime compared to the rest of the city,” Adamo said in an email Thursday.
Adamo did not specify where the Department of Health gets its crime data and did not respond to a question about whether Trail 525 could remain open if it were moved farther from the Ogden Community Public School.
CBC News has asked the Thunder Bay Police Service (TBPS) for an overview of criminal activity in the neighbourhoods.
Spokesman Matt Vis told CBC News that the service was reviewing the available data, but that “there are many factors that contribute to the prevalence of reported criminal activity and police calls in a given area.”
HART hub application on the way
Community advocates are calling on the province to reverse its decision or relocate Trail 525.
Ontario says it is spending $378 million on 19 new Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment (HART) centres and is encouraging SCS operators to adopt the model.
The hubs do not allow supervised drug use, safer delivery or needle exchange programs — all of which are offered at Path 525. NWCHC expects to submit an application to become a hub next week, Lawson said.
“We look forward to working with our partners to determine what this model should look like and hearing from our knowledgeable staff on what is important to include,” she said.
The City of Thunder Bay released a statement Tuesday evening saying it was disappointed with the news of the closure of Path 525, but expects the community “will continue to be considered a critical HART hub location.”
Rat poison, animal tranquilizers on street sales
When Baker first came to Path 525, he brought medications with him to use in the presence of health care professionals in case he overdosed. Clients have the option to have their medications tested before taking them, but it is not required.
After experiencing so many overdoses, Baker eventually entered the Safer Delivery Program and is now prescribed hydromorphone as an alternative to street delivery. He has not overdosed since entering the program.
“It’s exactly the same every time,” he said. “The thing about fentanyl or any street drug that you buy is you can buy the exact same block of drug and one batch — one batch could be one strength and the next batch could be 10 times stronger.”
While HART hubs do not allow drug use, it is unclear whether they will allow drug testing, Lawson said.
Path 525 in Thunder Bay, Ontario, is the only safe consumption site in northwestern Ontario. CBC’s Sarah Law went to see how the site’s drug testing machine works, while coordinator Nicole Fieduna demonstrates a bulk scan using a bag of sugar.
The NWCHC issued two drug warnings this week: turquoise fentanyl laced with rat poison sent several people to the hospital, and brown fentanyl caused a number of overdoses.
Of the 55 drug tests conducted last month, only 38 percent met expectations.
“We were able to tell those clients who were able to spread it right out on the street that no one wants to use this,” said Brittany D’Angelo, director of mental health and substance abuse programs at NWCHC.
Staff have educated clients about street drugs that include household cleaning products and animal tranquilizers.
“We’re also seeing things like benzodiazepines in the inventory or opioids that are even stronger than what the person intended to buy,” D’Angelo said. “We’re even seeing [opioids] where someone had no intention of purchasing an opioid at all.”
Testing drugs also gives healthcare providers better insight into what they are dealing with, she says.
“He didn’t want to die”
Debbie Reed lost her son Johnny in March 2020. She describes him as an outdoors enthusiast who enjoyed fishing, camping, sports and spending time with his family.
“Johnny was ‘Mr. Funny,’ and he was super good-looking. We called him ‘Hollywood,’ and he knew it,” Reed said.
Johnny died at age 29 after a decade-long struggle with addiction. He left behind two young daughters. Going to Path 525 was part of his routine.
“He trusted that service there and he had his drugs tested there because he didn’t want to die,” Reed said. “He wanted to get off drugs and he knew there was counseling and treatment there.”
Since her son’s death, Reed has become involved in the Thunder Bay recovery community and has healing through connection with other mothers who have lost children to addiction.
To her, closing Pad 525 means disconnecting clients from a system that keeps them alive.
“They’re not dead and their families are eternally grateful. These are the people Doug Ford needs to be talking to, not the people who are speaking out against this program because they don’t understand it,” Reed said.
He trusted that service and had his drugs tested there because he didn’t want to die.– Debbie Reed of Thunder Bay, Ontario, says of her late son
In addition to keeping Path 525 open, Reed wants to see more doctors offering addiction treatment in Thunder Bay, more training on mental health and substance abuse, and more treatment options offered in the New prison complex under construction.
For now, she’s relying on the strength of Thunder Bay’s recovery community.
“As I sit with my arms around these boys, I feel my son smiling at me because he would love nothing more than to see his mom get better — and get better through the joy of recovery,” she said of her journey through grief.
Baker is a registered volunteer with Path 525, helping clean up the neighborhood. His plan was to end the Safer Supply program to help with the recovery. If the program ends before he reaches that goal, he doesn’t know what he’ll do.
“Right now I want the freedom of a normal life,” he said.
An event is planned for Wednesday, August 28th at Waverley Park from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. ET in honor of International Overdose Awareness Day at the end of the month. The event will feature community resource booths, a community art activity, overdose prevention training, free naloxone kits and activities to honor those who have died or been injured by overdose.
