Vancouver Safe Supply Program Begins Prescribing Take-Home Fentanyl

published on April 13, 2022 by Doug Johnson in Filter

Despite efforts to make medical safe supply programs in Canada as low-barrier as possible, they still require most participants to make daily trips into the clinic or a pharmacy to pick up their prescriptions, and consume them under supervision. Now, Vancouver’s PHS Community Services Society has launched a new Enhanced Access (EA) program that allows participants to purchase their prescriptions and take them home.

Available safe supply prescriptions include both injectable and smokable fentanyl, as well as hydromorphone. The EA options also include medications for opioid use disorder like oral methadone and injectable Sublocade.

They purchase their prescription from PHS’s onsite pharmacy. Each substance is priced equivalent to its street value, so that patients are paying about the same amount they would be if purchasing it without a prescription. Essentially, it’s the same process as purchasing a prescription for any other drug at any other pharmacy…