Sunshine House pushes to keep overdose prevention RV rolling as federal dollars dry up

A Winnipeg organization is asking for donations to keep its mobile overdose prevention site on the road until early next year while it attempts to secure further funds.

Sunshine House, a community drop-in and resource centre, has operated its harm reduction RV in Winnipeg over the past nine months, offering drug users a place to test their drugs and staff trained to respond to an overdose.

Davey Cole, co-ordinator of the mobile site, said the organization found out last week that its funding agreement with Health Canada would not be extended beyond October, and $275,000 is needed to keep the RV running until the end of next March.

"We're hoping to fundraise, but it shouldn't be on [the] community to fundraise for a public health initiative," Cole, who uses they/them pronouns, told CBC News.

Since last October, 19 overdoses were reversed at the RV, they said. In addition, there have been about 14,000 visits, including 5,000 to test drugs with a mobile mass spectrometer, which analyzes samples and has a library of several thousand chemical compounds.

The $65,000 machine also enables the organization to put out alerts about contaminated drugs in the city, said Cole.

Provincial data saysthere were 358 confirmed deaths fromoverdosesin Manitobain 2021, which is the most recent full year for which thatdata is available. There were another 42 suspected overdose deaths that year.

There were 63 confirmed fatalities due to an overdose and 15 suspected overdose deaths in the first three months of 2022, according to that data.

Sunshine House's harm reduction RV, which currently runs five days a week with about four staff, received a federal exemption last October under the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to operate in Winnipeg's downtown, West End, North End and Point Douglas communities.

Health Canada says it has provided about $385,000 to Sunshine House to run the mobile site as a pilot project from June 2022 to the endOctober 2023.

"All currently funded organizations are aware of the timelines for their projects," a departmentspokesperson said in a Tuesday statement to CBC News.

The federal health agency said its substance use and addictions program will accept new proposals in September for community-based projects, which offer solutions to issues such as toxic drug supplies, and organizations like Sunshine House are encouraged to apply.

Levi Foy, executive director of Sunshine House, said sending in a new application to Health Canada means the organization could be without a considerable source of funding until April.

"That is a significant gap for this type of service with no plans to implement a permanent solution for our community," he told CBC News.

Health Canada also suggested the organization look at possible changes or enhancements to the mobile site, said Foy, and Sunshine House needs to fundraise to help the mobile site stay open until the next fiscal year.

Shohan Illsley, executive director of the Manitoba Harm Reduction Network, said she was disappointed to learn of Sunshine House's dilemma.

"We are currently in a drug poisoning crisis, and this is one of our few tools that we have in the city of Winnipeg to support our relatives and prevent deaths," she said.

'We'll find a way'

Winnipeg's paramedics are already overwhelmed with the number of drug poisonings they're responding to, and more calls are expected if the mobile site closes, said Illsley.

Staff at Sunshine House's RV also provide HIV rapid tests and referrals to other necessary services, "so it's more than just dealing with the drug poisoning crisis, and this is really an on-the-ground, grassroots initiative to stop our relatives from dying," she said.

"If we lose it, we're going to see the numbers continue to climb up."

Manitoba is "the only province west of Quebec that does not have safe consumption services, and instead of that we had some funding to run this mobile overdose prevention site," said Illsley.

Last March, the province introduced legislation that would require a licence to provide addiction services such as supervised consumption services, saying it would not stand in the way of supervised consumption sites in Manitoba that received a federal exemption.

The Addictions Services Act, or Bill 33, did not proceed to a second reading in the legislature.

Premier Heather Stefanson has repeatedlycited safety and crime in explaining her opposition to supervised consumption sites.

Cole said Sunshine House has not reached out to the province for help to keep the RV running, and while the organization has some supporters on Winnipeg's city council, it has not heard back yet on whether that support will translate into dollars.

There's a strong chance thatSunshine House's RV couldclose, but Cole said the organization isdetermined to continue to provide a space for safe drug consumption in Winnipeg.

"We need money to keep going, but we are also looking at volunteer models. It is a thing that we need in the city so we'll make sure that it happens. We'll find a way."