Medically supervised injecting facilities
Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (12:10): (687) My question is for the Minister for Mental Health. Two recent reports, Penington’s Australia’s Annual Overdose Report and the coroner’s Victorian overdose deaths report, revealed shocking figures about fatal overdose in Geelong. For the past decade Geelong has recorded the highest number of unintentional overdose deaths of any Victorian regional area and has amongst the highest rates in the state. Meanwhile the frequency with which potent synthetic opioids like nitazenes have been present during such fatalities has been growing, almost doubling annually since January 2021, significantly increasing the likelihood of unintentional and fatal overdose. Minister, will you consider establishing an MSIR in Geelong?
Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (12:11): Thank you very much, Dr Mansfield, for your question and for your advocacy in relation to these issues. Obviously it is a very challenging set of circumstances that we find in the illicit drug market at the moment, and we have seen the volatility of the illicit drug market increase quite rapidly, quite quickly. Our government has made a series of very clear announcements about how we will tackle the rise of nitazenes and other synthetic opioids in the illicit drug market. Next sitting week we are going to be debating the pill-testing bill, which will obviously not only have a significant strengthening effect on our drug alert and intelligence system, but it will also save lives as we stand up both the fixed site in the middle of next year and start the process for our festival testing at the end of this year. So I look forward to that debate, and I am sure there will be a lot of questions in committee about all of these matters.
But in relation to the specific challenges in the community of Geelong, you would be aware that we have recently opened a fantastic mental health and AOD hub in the centre of Geelong. Together with Barwon Health and other key health providers, that service will be able to significantly boost the AOD services available to the community. I do not want to pre-empt the bill debate next sitting week, but we have also sought to increase the availability of naloxone across the community, so not only will we have naloxone available through our needle and syringe programs and our community health services, we will also of course be rolling out some additional availability through vending machines, which is part of the legislation that we will be bringing forward to the Council next week, should it pass the Assembly today.
We of course also have a number of initiatives in the statewide action plan to reduce drug harm which are relevant for regional communities, including Geelong, which I know you are familiar with. But we have made our position clear on the medically supervised injecting service being located in North Richmond, and the government has been clear that we have no plans to increase the number of safe injecting services in the state.
Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (12:14): I thank the minister for her response. Minister, one of the justifications provided by your government for not establishing a second MSIR in Melbourne was that 90 per cent of injecting drug use occurs outside of Melbourne’s CBD, including a significant proportion in regional areas like Geelong – Geelong in particular. People who inject drugs in Geelong are not going to travel to a supervised injecting facility in Richmond or even Melbourne’s CBD. We need those facilities where people are using drugs, and it is clear there is a need in Geelong. So why aren’t regional Victorians like those in Geelong being given the same access to an MSIR as their metro counterparts?
Ingrid STITT (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Mental Health, Minister for Ageing, Minister for Multicultural Affairs) (12:15): I thank Dr Mansfield for her supplementary question. We have been talking through these issues for a while now, and I think we have been very clear about the government’s position on this. We see the North Richmond safe injecting service forming a really important part of our whole ecosystem of AOD services across the state. I would also add that in terms of the increasing dangers of synthetic opioids entering the market, we are in the process of setting up a ministerial advisory committee of experts in the field so that we can ensure that I, as the minister, and the department are getting the most appropriate advice on how to tackle these challenges. We have also recently finalised recruitment for the state’s first chief addiction medicine officer, who will sit within Safer Care Victoria.
The PRESIDENT: Can I acknowledge that former member of this chamber Philip Davis is in the gallery.