A supervised consumption site at a central Edmonton hospital is closing on Tuesday.
Recovery Alberta confirmed, in line with an earlier announcement, the site at the Royal Alexandra Hospital is being shuttered. The site’s website has already been taken down.
The supervised consumption service was for exclusive use of patients at the Royal Alex hospital, located north of the downtown core.
It provided a hygienic environment where people who use pre-obtained drugs were monitored while taking them, to reduce harm from substance use while also receiving additional supports and connections to recovery-oriented services.
In November, Mental Health and Addiction Minister Rick Wilson said the supervised consumption site would be replaced with a rapid access treatment site.
Recovery Alberta did not immediately provide details about when the treatment centre would be operational.
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The closure leaves two remaining Edmonton supervised consumption services, where substance users can access clean supplies for drug use and supervision in case of an overdose.
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One is at the George Spady Centre (10015 105A Ave.) and the other at Radius Community Health and Healing (10628 96 St.), both located just under a kilometre apart from each other north of the downtown core in central Edmonton.
The now closed-supervised consumption site at Boyle Street Community Services (10116-105 Ave.) on March 22, 2018.
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Alberta began 2025 with seven supervised consumption sites — three in Edmonton along with one each in Calgary, Lethbridge, Grande Prairie and Red Deer. With the shuttering of the Royal Alexandra location and past closure in Red Deer, there are five remaining.
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That is expected to decrease.
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Nathaniel Dueck, a spokesperson for Wilson’s ministry, says the province is planning to close Calgary’s only supervised consumption site, at the Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre, next year.
“Our government believes that anyone struggling with addiction deserves the opportunity to seek treatment and live a healthy and hopeful life,” Dueck wrote.
“We also believe that Albertans should feel safe where they live and work, and businesses should be able to operate without disturbance from social disorder.”
On Monday, Calgary Mayor Jeromy Farkas said the city had not formally discussed the supervised consumption site operations at Sheldon M. Chumir with the province, but says there needs to be a plan.
“We need to make sure that there’s a transition process and that we’re simply not just moving the social disorder and drug use from inside the Sheldon Chumir to outside into the nearby park and public spaces,” he said.
Calgary’s firefighters say they also want to see a plan.
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“(We) are on the front lines of the opioid epidemic, and our members are sadly dealing with more and more overdoses,” Jamie Blayney, the head of the Calgary Firefighters Association, said in a statement.
“We know that closing the (supervised consumption site) will not decrease overdoses, and we look forward to seeing what solutions the provincial government will bring forward.”
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Safe consumption controversy country-wide
Earlier this year, Red Deer City council urged the Alberta government to replace the Red Deer Overdose Prevention Site with other harm reduction measures. At the time, city council said it planned to take a proactive approach to addressing the root causes of addiction and bolster its treatment services.
Like in Red Deer, municipal leadership in Lethbridge voted to request the Alberta government close the city’s overdose prevention unit “as part of the planned transition to recovery-focused services.”
Data from Alberta’s Substance use surveillance platform, posted up to the middle of this year, shows that the supervised consumption sites in Calgary and Lethbridge have consistently been the most visited sites since the middle of 2024.
In the past two years, both cities have also had a dramatic drop in the number of overdose deaths. The decline in Edmonton has been far less pronounced.
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In Lethbridge in 2023, there was a rate of 109 deaths per 100,000 people. Data up until August this year shows that rate has plunged to less than 10.
Speaking to reporters last week, Mayor Blaine Hyggen said he introduced the motion to close the site because the money saved could be used for other critical programs, and showed skepticism between the city’s supervised consumption site and the reduction in deaths.
Morgan Magnuson, a registered nurse and instructor at the University of Lethbridge, penned an open letter to Lethbridge City Council urging it rescind its motion, saying closure puts those who use the clinic at risk.
As of Tuesday, it had close to 800 signatures.
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