Customer Experience

Opioid vending machines expand in Canada

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June 9, 2021

Opioid vending machines for heroin addicts will be expanding from Vancouver to three additional cities — Dartmouth, Nova Scotia; London, Ontario; and Victoria, B.C. — thanks to Health Canada's Substance Use and Addictions Program funding, according to a ricochet media report.

The MySafe initiative has received nearly $3.5 million in funding from the federal government.

Since the first opioid dispenser was installed in Vancouver in early 2020, Dr. Mark Tyndall, the primary prescribing doctor of the MySafe project, has seen patients who were previously at risk of poisoned street drugs improve.

The machines allow patients to access drugs without interacting with others, thereby creating a space free of stigma and judgment.