A heroin user passed out under a bridge in Philadelphia, where a federal prosecutor filed suit to prevent the opening of safe injection sites aimed at reducing the death rate among addicts during the US opioid epidemic (SPENCER PLATT)

New York (AFP) – A federal prosecutor in Philadelphia has filed suit to try to block what would be the first supervised injection site in the United States.

With US drugs deaths reaching epidemic levels, the Safehouse Association has said it wants to open a safe injection site in the Philadelphia area, but it has not yet said where.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney has already publicly declared support for creating such sites; and the association has many supporters in this city hard-hit for decades by drug abuse.

In 2017, 1,217 people died of overdoses in Philadelphia, including 1,074 from opiates, figures similar to Los Angeles and New York, where the population is four to five times greater, the office said in a statement released Wednesday.

William McSwain, the US attorney for the eastern district of Pennsylvania, is arguing that the sites would be illegal, and said that if Safehouse wants to open such sites, it should first “work through the democratic process to try to change the law.”

“The proponents of the injection site share our goal of ending this terrible epidemic,” he said in a statement. “We all want solutions that save lives, but allowing private citizens to break long-established federal drug laws passed by Congress is not an acceptable path forward.”

McSwain also argued such sites would create major public safety concerns.

Yet “the evidence shows that an OPS (Overdose Prevention Center) in Philadelphia can save lives, and help reduce the negative impacts the opioid epidemic has wrought on Philadelphia neighborhoods,” said Deana Gamble, the city’s communications chief.

In May 2018, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio announced his intention to set up such sites to reduce the number of overdoses in his city. But so far, they have not been launched.

The sites were pioneered by Switzerland.

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