Supervised Injection Facility Working Group

Drug Science believes that there is good real-world evidence for the positive effects of Supervised Injecting Facilities (SIFs) across the globe.

SIFs are known by many names including Supervised Injection Facilities, Overdose Prevention Centres, and Drug Consumption Rooms. There are subtle nuances between these three amenities, however, their function is to provide safe spaces for people to consume controlled drugs under the supervision of people who can save lives if overdoses occur.

Drug Science believes that access to sterile equipment, overdose prevention and treatment benefits both people who use drugs and the wider community.

Drug Science deems it important to develop the evidence base for reducing drug-related harms by piloting SIFs in the UK. This collaborative initiative will evaluate whether establishing SIFs would; prove to be cost effective, reduce crime, improve public health, lessen drug litter, and increase engagement in treatment services.

The SIF working group encourages the use of a participatory development approach in the design and development of SIFs. Consulting people who will be the end users of the SIF in the design, development and implementation is key to ensure the model is fit for purpose, community friendly, and holds the confidence of the local drug using community. People who use drugs are sadly familiar with experiencing discrimination in health and social care settings. As such, those developing new services need to actively demonstrate their commitment to a non-judgemental and rights-based approach and participatory development is a good starting point. When the community owns and supports the SIF then this will help with client recruitment, quality management and advocacy.

The Supervised Injection Facility Working Group (SIFWG) is a consortium of Drug Science experts, leading academics, researchers, people who use drugs, and policy specialists. The SIFWG will work with several partners to establish pilot SIFs for evaluation. Furthermore, the group will inform legal reform and produce recommendations to enable the development of the evidence base on SIFs. In addition to this, it will collate and communicate the evidence base on the role of SIFs in reducing drug-related harm.