Street Health Overdose Prevention Site
338 Dundas St. E. Toronto, ON, Canada

Overdose Prevention Sites save lives. In March 2019, our OPS funding was abruptly eliminated. We urgently need your help keeping our doors open. Please consider donating to our OPSyour donation could save a life: https://fundrazr.com/weatheredstreethealthOPS

Please help us keep our doors open! https://fundrazr.com/weatheredstreethealthOPS

Street Health will be closed on Monday, August 3rd for the Civic Holiday. We will re-open at 11 am on Tuesday, August 4th. If you require Supervised Consumption/Safe Injection Services on Monday, please go to: -The Works, Dundas and Victoria, open 10 am 10 pm -Fred Victor, Queen and Jarvis, open 8 am 10 pm -St. Stephen’s, College and Augusta, open 8 am 2 pm... Stay safe we care about you!

Crack cocaine contaminated with fentanyl has been making the rounds in multiple neighborhoods in the city numerous times over the last year. People who use crack are often more susceptible to fatal overdose due to a lack of tolerance to opioids, and not taking precautions to avoid overdose the way opioid users might. It’s important for everyone who uses drugs to be trained on and carry naloxone, to be careful, and to not use alone. However the only way to truly end the risk of overdose is for Canada to decriminalize all drugs and provide a Safe Supply. Please be safe out there, we love you .

We are utterly heartbroken that Ontario has become the national leader in overdose deaths and that in Toronto there has been a two-fold increase in overdose deaths among people who are homeless - 23% of people who died from accidental opioid toxicity in 2019 were experiencing homelessness compared to 11% in 2018. These are preventable deaths, and this situation was utterly predictable given the inaction of the provincial government. As a well-used overdose prevention site em...bedded in an agency that has served homeless people since the mid 1980s, we fail to understand why we remain unfunded by the province and forced to rely on fundraising to keep the doors open. We could be expanding our response rather than having to fight for the status quo as our community is decimated around us. We are in full support of the demands of the Toronto Overdose Prevention Society: 1. Decriminalize simple possession and use of all drugs, defund the police, and re-invest the resources in community-led overdose response initiatives 2. Increase funding to existing harm reduction and overdose prevention programs within low-threshold community organizations that prioritize the involvement and leadership of people who use drugs 3. Integrate harm reduction supports, peer witnessing, and Overdose Prevention Sites in shelters, respites, and the hotels and apartments being opened to house people who are unsheltered and/or experiencing homelessness during the COVID-19 pandemic. 4. Immediately expand funding for Safer Opioid Supply programs to provide an alternative for people who use drugs from an ongoing toxic street drug supply, and restore funding to Overdose Prevention Sites that have had their funding cut by the Ford government.

Friday June 19th! ABOLISH THE POLICE JUNTEENTH SIT IN! From 12-6pm beginning at College & Bay ending at City Hall. We are occupying Bay st for a peaceful sit in... and celebration of Freedom & Liberation, with demands to defund the Toronto police to abolishing the police! (Full demands will be posted soon) Please bring food and water, sunscreen & energy! We will be practicing social distancing so bring a mask & IF YOU’RE SICK, STAY HOME! Information is in the post above & we will be posting general call outs for volunteers to help social distancing protocol & PPE distribution! BE READY! No justice, No peace! #notanotherblacklife #blacklivesmatter See more

We are pleased to partner with Twentytwenty Arts for the Weathered project. Weathered is asking the public to produce memorialized photographs of shoes and mementos belonging to loved ones who have lost their lives to an overdose. This project will raise funds for the Street Health Overdose Prevention Site, which recieves no government funding and relies on fundraising to sustain the life-saving services we offer. All photograph submissions will be accepted (until July 6th, ...2020). We encourage everyone, regardless of skill level, to submit a memorialized photograph with a written description about their loved one. More information on how to submit a photograph can be found here: https://www.twentytwentyarts.com/weathered

Street Health’s Overdose Prevention Site shares in the collective grief & outrage around the murder of George Floyd and the countless other cases of over-policing, violence, and murder inflicted upon Black communities by the police and by the structures of racism currently present in our society. We stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, acknowledging that this issue is not exclusive to the United States, and that Canada has long been complicit in racist an...d colonial violence against Black and Indigenous peoples. This is made evident by the death of Regis Korchinski-Paquet during an encounter with Toronto Police this past week. Harm reduction is built on principles of social justice. Our fight against bad drug policy and the war on drug users cannot be successful if it does not include the ongoing work of dismantling oppressive systems. Racism, colonialism, and police violence are issues that impact many members of the community we serve and are intrinsically tied to the war on drugs. Canada’s criminal justice system and drug policies are rooted in colonialism and racial prejudice and have been developed and enforced in ways that disproportionally impact Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC). Black people make up about 2.9% of the Canadian population but 8.6% of federal prisoners. Indigenous people make up only 4.3% of the Canadian population, but 38% of inmates in women’s prisons and 26% of inmates in men’s prisons are Indigenous. As an organization based on the traditional territories of many Indigenous nations, where many of our staff benefit from colonialism and white privilege, we would like to remind ourselves and our white supporters to listen to and amplify Black and Indigenous voices, to consider our own privileges and how we profit from racist structures, and to do what we can to support initiatives in our community to organize and fight for justice on the front lines. Local Places to Donate, Petitions to Sign, Protest Schedules and Updates: https://docs.google.com//1l0TGDdHJIO6FGkKNWBBXINUmfGSXdM8e Defund Toronto Police/Call for Action Template: https://docs.google.com//1roduncOZ_y0C_oWIMIQ6yV-13fZqck0i Thorough List of Resources and Places to Donate: https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/ Local Black-owned Businesses and Events: https://byblacks.com/directory Toronto Protestor Bail Fund: https://www.gofundme.com/f/toronto-protestor-bail-fund Help pay people’s bail/fight the racist criminal (in)justice system: https://bailproject.org/ Photo Credit: www.BlackLivesMatter.com @blklivesmatter

Thanks so much to https://thebasketproject.org for dropping off over 30 kits filled with essential items to help make COVID-19 a little bit easier for our homeless clients!

SHOPS is making merch! For now we are getting two t-shirt designs done, but want feedback on which designs to get printed. So, which drawings would you like to see us produce as shirts? Vote with reacts. Make sure you are reacting to the OG post! Also if you want to see more than one design made feel free to leave extra votes in the comments. Thanks!! Stay Safe! - Harm Reduction Builds Healthy Communities - Drug Users Deserve Safety & Support - Harm Reduction Saves... Lives - End the War on People Who Use Drugs - Harm Reduction Heroes See more

Street Health will be closed this Monday, May 4th. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause for clients. Please make use of other sites in the area and stay safe. We’ll hopefully be open as usual on Tuesday. Nearby sites that will be open on Monday: ... Regent Park Community Health Centre 465 Dundas St. E (at Parliament) 10am - 3:30pm Fred Victor 139 Jarvis St. (at Queen E) 8:30 am - 11 pm