Harper Watch
BY Peter Trainor
Photography by Reuters: Chris Wattie
How do we measure the success of a public health project? In the case of Vancouver’s Insite safe-injection facility, Stephen Harper seems a little confused. The project has some backers—the premier, the mayor, the police department’s chief constable, the chief coroner—and research findings published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the New England Journal of Medicine and the British Medical Journal all conclude that the three-and-a-half-year-old pilot project has been a resounding success, both saving lives and improving community safety. So is it any wonder that Harper is refusing to guarantee its operation past 2007?
