Results of Ottawa Public Health harm reduction public consultation study

This past summer, Ottawa Public Health conducted a public consultation survey on enhanced harm reduction services in Ottawa. Over 2,200 people completed the survey, which was available online and in paper format in English and French. The survey was anonymous, confidential, and voluntary.



Survey results indicated that:

• 60% of respondents thought that offering harm reduction services in more areas of the city would be beneficial.
• 66% of respondents thought that longer hours would be beneficial.
• 62% of respondents thought that having harm reduction dispensing units available would be beneficial.
• 66% of respondents thought that having supervised injection services available would be beneficial.

When asked for recommendations on how to address community concerns, specifically regarding
supervised injection services, the top three recommendations were:

1. Provide information to the community about the goals and benefits of supervised injection services (61%);
2. Evaluate services, share results with the community and respond to evaluation results (58%);
3. Establish a community advisory group to identify and address issues as they emerge (50%).

Read the full report here.