Last week's unanimous Supreme Court decision that allows Vancouver to operate Insite, North America's first supervised injection site, was a victory for harm reduction and a ringing endorsement for a more sensible approach to illicit drug use in Canada. The court battle essentially pitted a highly successful evidence-based program that saves lives, reduces drug use, and connects drug users to health care services against our federal government's commitment to stopping drug use through criminal deterrents.

While he was deputy chief of the Ottawa Police Service, Larry Hill fought for a harm reduction program for crack addicts – a crack pipe program – calling the prevailing view among police chiefs at the time “dark ages thinking” on harm reduction.

A prominent Ottawa doctor says he’s ready to lead an effort to bring a safe injection site for drug addicts to the nation’s capital. But he’ll have to overcome strong opposition from Ottawa’s mayor and chief of police first.

When Dr. Mark Tyndall moved to Ottawa from Vancouver earlier this year to take up the post of head of infectious diseases at the Ottawa Hospital, he was surprised at what he saw. The overdose rate among injection drug users seemed to be high, although it was difficult to find stats to confirm that, and the rate of HIV transmission was among the highest in the country. In Vancouver, those kinds of issues helped inspire the community to support a safe injection site, Insite, which the Supreme Court of Canada has just ruled should stay open.

Vancouver's controversial Insite clinic can stay open, the Supreme Court said Friday in a landmark ruling.

In a unanimous decision, the court ruled that not allowing the clinic to operate under an exemption from drug laws would be a violation of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The court ordered the federal minister of health to grant an immediate exemption to allow Insite to operate.