• The city of Marseille organized the first international risk reduction meetings.

  • Michèle Rubirola, first deputy mayor in charge of health, asked for advice from her counterparts in Paris and Strasbourg, who talked about pedagogy and consultation.

  • The chosen location will accommodate 150 people per day in the city center of Marseille, and its exact location will be known at the beginning of 2023.

By organizing this Thursday in Marseille the first international meetings on risk reduction, the city is taking one more step towards the opening of a “shooting room”.

"I want the place to be chosen at the start of next year, after which there will be consultation and co-construction with the inhabitants", promises Michèle Rubirola, first deputy mayor, in charge of health, without giving a more precise timetable. .

At the end of her inaugural speech, she applauded Patrick Padovani, the former health representative who at the time convinced Jean-Claude Gaudin to open such a room.

The project was to be born in a branch of the Conception hospital, in 2020. “We had almost everything planned, except the stupid decision of a sector mayor”, loose the person concerned in the public.

This time, the place chosen to accommodate 150 people a day will not be a hospital.

And after visiting Quai 9, Geneva's reception and lower-risk consumption space, opened more than twenty years ago, the elected official no longer rules out fitting out the room in algecos on municipal land. .

Finding a 400 m² building in the city center that meets the specifications seems to be one of the main obstacles to the Marseille project today.

With the reception of local residents, even if, says Michèle Rubirola, “the population who elected us is in favor of it”.

The project is indeed part of the Marseille Spring campaign promises.

Only two rooms in France, in Paris and Strasbourg

“Co-construction must take place upstream to overcome reluctance but also afterwards, with a review clause depending on what is happening”, advises Anne Souyris, deputy mayor of Paris on public health issues, who has put in place set up a neighborhood committee.

“It takes a lot of pedagogy, we have very active micro-groups on social networks”, abounds Alexandre Feltz, deputy mayor of Strasbourg, who recently experienced this with the opening of a syringe kiosk. .

The two cities are currently the only ones in France to have opened a lower-risk consumption room in 2016.

With fifteen injection stations for the first, and a dozen stations, including four inhalation, for that of the European capital.

“Since 2021, a new law has made it possible to experiment with this type of structure, why do other cities such as Lyon, Bordeaux, Nantes, etc., not engage?

“, launches Alexandre Feltz, while “all the big cities of Europe have such rooms”.

The number of syringes in the street divided by three

In addition to the very enriching feedback from the various managers of structures, who succeeded each other during these meetings, a resident of the 19th arrondissement in Paris testified on behalf of the collective of local residents who supported the setting up of the shooting room Parisian: "The main affect of elected officials and residents is fear, fear of losing votes on one side, fear of losing peace on the other.

To this, the collective opposes "realpolitik" and "precise indicators": "The number of syringes collected from the ground has been divided by three, consumption in the street is falling and such a structure succeeds in increasing the proportion of users who are coping, that is to say who are doing better and stabilizing their consumption.

»

These rooms are not places for weaning, but for prevention and reduction of the risks associated with used syringes and overconsumption.

"A consumption space allows you to go further in the care proposal, support is a precious tool", recalls Nicolas Ducournau, coordinator of the risk reduction room in Strasbourg.

According to him, it is also a privileged observation post for changes in practice and the responses to be provided.

In Strasbourg, for example, Fentanyl patches represent 20% of consumption sessions.

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Marseille: Residents opposed to the installation of the city's first "shooting room"

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Drug addiction: We visited the first "shooting room" in Paris

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