"Evaluation studies have found an overall positive impact on the communities where these facilities are located. However, as with needle and syringe programmes, consultation with local key actors is essential to minimise community resistance or counter-productive police responses. Drug treatment centres offering supervised consumption facilities have generally been accepted by local communities and businesses (Thein et al., 2005). Their establishment has been associated with a decrease in public injecting (e.g. Salmon et al., 2007) and a reduction in the number of syringes discarded in the vicinity (Wood et al., 2004). For example, in Barcelona, a fourfold reduction was reported in the number of unsafely disposed syringes being collected in the vicinity from a monthly average of over 13 000 in 2004 to around 3 000 in 2012 (Vecino et al., 2013).
"The effect of the Sydney supervised injecting facility on drug-related property crime and violent crime in its local area was examined using time series analysis of police-recorded theft and robbery incidents (Freeman et al., 2005). No evidence was found that the existence of the facility led to either an increase or decrease in thefts or robberies around the facility. Similarly, a study by Wood and colleagues compared the monthly number of charges for drug trafficking, assaults and robbery — crimes that are commonly linked to drug use — in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside the year before versus the year after the local drug consumption room opened and found that the establishment of the facility was not associated with a marked increase in these crimes (Wood et al., 2006)."
"Perspectives On Drugs: Drug consumption rooms: an overview of provision and evidence," European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, June 2017.
