SF’s permissive drug culture plays a part in the overdose crisis
German Lopez’ New York Times reporting examines San Francisco’s lenient stance on drugs, how it’s rooted in destigmatization, and has doubled overdose deaths since 2018. Harm-reduction programs like GLIDE prioritize body autonomy over treatment. Locals face a sobering reality: tolerance is enabling tragedy.
For some San Franciscans, a drug crisis is just part of city living. They see people shooting up in front of their homes and businesses. They often find someone dozing on a sidewalk, high. Sometimes, they check for a pulse. “That’s how I found my first dead body,” said Adam Mesnick, owner of a local deli.
But the city’s drug crisis is relatively new. In 2018, San Francisco’s overdose death rate roughly matched the national average. Last year, its death rate was more than double the national level.
In San Francisco and other liberal cities, the opposite shift has happened with hard drug use. The culture has become more tolerant of people using drugs. When I asked people living on the streets why they are in San Francisco, the most common response was that they knew they could avoid the legal and social penalties that often follow addiction. Some came from as close as Oakland, believing that San Francisco was more permissive. As Keith Humphreys, a drug policy expert at Stanford University, told me, San Francisco “is on the extreme of a pro-drug culture.”
One example of this shift: In early 2020, an advocacy group put up a billboard downtown to promote the use of naloxone, an overdose antidote. It showed happy young people seeming to enjoy a high together. “Know overdose,” the billboard said. “Use with people and take turns.” Here, drug use wasn’t dangerous as long as users had someone to check on them while high.
The shift is also present in drug-related service providers in San Francisco. Michael Discepola, director of health access at the program GLIDE, said that his organization wants people to use drugs more safely. Abstinence is not always the correct goal, he argued. When one client declared that he wanted to quit drugs, Discepola explained, GLIDE suggested “more realistic goals.”
In San Francisco, harm-reduction programs such as GLIDE do not require staff to guide people toward treatment. They argue that such pushiness could scare away clients who are not interested in quitting drugs. They often cite the drug policies of British Columbia, a global leader in harm reduction. But British Columbia set a record for overdose death rates last year.
Read the whole thing here.
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