Jonathan Goyer Interview

So a lot of people are talking about the next step in harm reduction: supervised injection sites (SIFs), which would allow people to shoot up under the supervision of medical professionals, with clean needles and cotton balls and everything else. It’s pretty controversial, because some people say it’s essentially encouraging people to use heroin. What do you think?

If I was king of the world, I would say open one now. To me, it’s not about whether I think it's morally right or not. SIFs have been running for long enough in other countries that you can step back and look at the impact, and the numbers are good: There's fewer overdoses. In Norway, they even have a heroin clinic there. Not a methadone clinic. A heroin clinic. We're looking into things like that. Overdoses go down, new cases of HIV go down, and new cases of hepatitis C go down. From an evidence-based standpoint, I can't help but be on board for it. I think more and more people are beginning to understand that jail is not the answer and that addiction is a disease and it needs to be treated like a disease, and not punished.

https://www.gq.com/story/heroin-rhode-island-interview