The 2024 Penington Institute’s Annual Overdose Report stated that, ‘in 2022 there were 2,356 drug-induced deaths in Australia, equating to approximately six lives needlessly lost each day’.
Drug law reform, including safe injecting rooms, saves lives. The Kings Cross Uniting Medically Supervised Injecting Centre (MSIC), NSW’s only safe injecting room, opened its doors 25 years ago.
Throughout its 25 years of existence it has assisted over 12,000 people who have experienced an overdose without a single death.
The centre does not supply drugs to users but provides a safe space for them to take them with supervision and intervention if things go wrong.
MSIC opened as a result of the 1999 NSW Drug Summit when there was a heroin epidemic and as a result the NSW Labor Carr government were able to implement a trial of a supervised injecting facility.
25 years later it has been proven a success. Not only has it seen no deaths on its premises during that time it has seen over 27,000 referrals to ongoing care and support.
However, getting to Kings Cross from Northern NSW is quite a trip, and certainly not an easy one just to have a safe space to inject.
Yet according to NSW Health Needs Assessment 2025-2028, in Northern NSW ‘more people are hospitalised due to opioid-related misuse in both Northern NSW LHD (142 per 100,000 residents) and Mid North Coast LHD (150 per 100,000)… than in NSW (121 per 100,000) (NSW government, 2023).’
The 2024 NSW Drug Summit recommended removing the legislative limitation that means only one medically supervised injecting centre, the one in Kings Cross, can operate in NSW.
‘This would open the door to the community consultations for more centres,’ explained former magistrate David Heilpern on www.sydneycriminallawyers.com.au.
‘The recommendation states unequivocally, “there were multiple calls across all consultations to expand the number and location”. According to government, they know better, and a need for more has not been established.’
The illegality of drugs artificially causes very high street prices, making drug dealing very profitable due to its risk, and the prevalence of drug use throughout the population makes it a big business. The Australian Institute of Criminology (AIC) estimates that in Australia illicit drugs account for $19bn within the Australian economy every year.
The illegality of drug use is routinely ignored by almost half the Australian population. According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) ‘an estimated 10.2 million (47 per cent) people aged 14 and over in Australia had illicitly used a drug at some point in their lifetime’ and since 2007 illicit drug use has continued to climb in the Australian population.
Drug use reform has been taking place around the world and Australia has historically been a world leader with the implementation of options, like the safe injecting room in Kings Cross, that ensures a reduced cost to the taxpayer compared to alternative healthcare costs. It is time to recognise this success and the lives it saves, not just directly by assisting with drug overdoses, but indirectly by connecting people to services that change their lives, their families’ lives, and their friends’ lives, and reduce the health care costs to the Australian people.
‘We again repeat our calls for the NSW government to finally respond to the report from the Drug Summit in 2024 with a detailed plan, and the required funding to implement the report’s recommendations,’ Uniting NSW. ACT’s Director Advocacy and External Relations, Emma Maiden, said.
‘We also call on the NSW government to send everyone some birthday cheer by removing that single sentence in an outdated piece of legislation that prevents any other injecting service in NSW besides ours at Kings Cross.’
Aslan Shand, editor
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