$30 million grant funds pipes for smoking crack cocaine and crystal methamphetamine, as DOJ considers facilitating locations for taking illegal drugs.
QUICK FACTS:
- Joe Biden’s Health and Human Services department (HHS) is finalizing funding to dole out crack pipes to drug addicts as part of its “Harm Reduction Plan,” The Daily Mail reports.
- The $30 million grant program will begin handing out money in May, providing funds to nonprofits and local governments to make drug use “safer” and to advance “racial equity.”
- The grant money will be used to purchase “safe smoking kits/supplies,” including pipes for users to smoke substances like crack cocaine and crystal methamphetamine, or “any illicit substance.”
- HHS says that the kits are meant to limit the risk of infection, as smoking out of glass pipes can lead to cuts and sores that become infected with diseases like Hepatitis-C, Daily Mail notes.
- The department also claims handing out drug paraphernalia will prompt users to smoke rather than inject themselves with some substances, like meth, as injection is far riskier.
- The program is aimed at “underserved communities,” including members of “racial, ethnic, sexual, and gender minority groups.”
- Biden’s Justice Department is also considering green-lighting so-called safe injection sites, safe havens for people to use heroin and other narcotics, according to The Associated Press.
- The Justice Department said it is “evaluating” such facilities and talking to regulators about “appropriate guardrails,” such as maintaining protections against fatal overdoses.
- Such sites exist in Canada, Australia, and Europe and have been discussed for years in New York and some other U.S. cities and states, AP notes, as a few unofficial facilities have been operating for some time.
- Critics argue that safe injection sites encourage illegal drug use and burden neighborhoods, U.S. Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, a New York City Republican, arguing, “Instead of stopping the deadly drugs streaming over our border, putting drug dealers behind bars and helping people receive the long-term treatment they need to overcome addiction, Democrat leadership is enabling illegal drug use.”
- The Biden administration’s facilitation of drug use comes as the number of overdose deaths in the United States last year exceeded 100,000 per year for the first time in the nation’s history, more than the toll of car crashes and gun fatalities combined, according to The New York Times.
- Overdose deaths have more than doubled since 2015, as data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that overdose deaths rose 28.5% in the 12 months ending April 2021.
WHAT BIDEN’S DOJ SAID ABOUT INJECTION HAVENS:
“Although we cannot comment on pending litigation, the Department is evaluating supervised consumption sites, including discussions with state and local regulators about appropriate guardrails for such sites, as part of an overall approach to harm reduction and public safety,” the Department of Justice said.
BACKGROUND:
- The Biden admin’s acceptance of injection havens for drug addicts contrasts Trump’s White House tenure, when prosecutors fought vigorously against plans to open a safe consumption site in Philadelphia, AP notes.
- The CDC said in November that “deaths from synthetic opioids (primarily fentanyl) and psychostimulants such as methamphetamine also increased in the 12-month period ending in April 2021. Cocaine deaths also increased, as did deaths from natural and semi-synthetic opioids (such as prescription pain medication).”
- Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, has struggled with crack cocain addiction, The New York Post publishing photographs retrieved from Hunter’s laptop appearing to show him unconscious with a used crack pipe in his mouth.
