Much of the opposition to it in Thunder Bay, where opiate addictions are reaching epidemic levels (we have had three pharmacy robberies in the past two weeks, where the robber used a bloody syringe to get OxyContin), is the business model depending on having customers to make a profit, which removes the incentive to help people. These clinics are a private business. (That's why they can go almost anywhere that is zone for, say, a dentists office; zoning was an issue with our most recent clinic, people claimed it couldn't go there but according to the law, it can.)
The actual clinics themselves (we have three with plans for two more, for only 110,000 people) haven't caused any real problems. Most people don't even know where they are (except the most recent one, which was controversial because a business owner two blocks away flipped out) because they're discrete. (The sign simply says "OATC", and their entrances are usually onto sides of buildings or back alley parking lots.) Of the three pharmacy robberies, only one was within a kilometre of an OATC clinic. The other was more than 2 miles away, but in an area where one is proposed.
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Originally Posted by drpgq
Maybe, although I always seem to see the same faces.
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I takes a very long time to recover from opiate addiction, you have to be weaned off very slowly. My uncle couldn't do it (he was murdered a few years ago), and I have another uncle whose girlfriend has been going through it for five years, on and off, with little real success.
A lot of people going to the clinics here (the bulk of the customers at our most recently opened clinic) are just normal people who unintentionally got addicted to their pain meds and need help, but sale of illegal pills is growing in the north, it is almost as popular as alcohol. The crime problem related to these clinics still isn't as much of a problem as crime in general; it's quite an insignificant contributor. If anything, the people controlling the sale of Oxys would be the biggest opponents; they'd lose customers.
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