Nothing says ‘harm reduction’ like helping addicts overdose
Zachary Faria
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When you hear the phrase “harm reduction,” you assume that it means some sort of public safety program, perhaps one designed to protect people from themselves.
When you’re in Portland, it means helping drug addicts do crack, meth, and fentanyl.
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Multnomah County, home to Portland, is altering its “harm reduction” program since drug addicts aren’t using syringes as often as they did back in 2019. The county will now be giving out tin foil, straws, glass pipes, and snorting kits that come with spoons to ensure that drug addicts can continue to kill themselves with crack and methamphetamine. The state of Oregon saw more than 1,000 overdose deaths in 2021, and around 9,000 emergency room visits.
The problem has become drastically worse since the “harm reduction” began in 2019. Fentanyl deaths in Multnomah County jumped from 26 in 2019 to 209 in 2022. Portland is littered with homeless encampments, and the deaths of homeless people jumped 53% from 2020 to 2021. Unsurprisingly, the majority of those deaths were drug overdoses. “Harm reduction” never looked so harmful.
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The logic goes that offering free drug kits to drug addicts won’t create new drug addicts, but it will help active drug addicts seek treatment, assuming they don’t overdose before then. Even many of the liberals in charge have begun souring on this idea, as Portland’s mayor and city commissioner both denounced the move, and even Multnomah County’s commissioner isn’t sold on the county’s plan.
You can dress up a plan in academic jargon and “compassion” all you like, but when the plan is to help drug addicts do the drugs that are killing them, “harm reduction” is probably the least appropriate name for it. Perhaps everyone involved here should be putting down the crack pipes, figuratively and literally.