PORTLAND, Maine — The creation of sites where people can inject drugs under medical supervision received mostly favorable testimony during a Portland City Council committee meeting, but the panel took no action on the proposal.
The creation of such a consumption site in Maine’s largest city could be the first of its kind in the country. Cities around the U.S. are debating the issue, due to the nation’s overdose epidemic.
The Portland City Council’s Health and Human Services and Public Safety Committee took testimony on Tuesday, but no action, the Portland Press Herald reported.
Molly Kravitz, a student at the University of Maine School of Law, said during the hearing that Portland “can become the model for the rest of the country by becoming the first government sanctioned safe consumption site in the country.”
Maine’s overdose epidemic has grown in recent years. There were 258 overdose deaths in the state in the first half of 2020. That was an increase of 27 percent over the last six months of 2019.