Alberta closing supervised drug consumption site at Edmonton’s Royal Alexandra Hospital

The Alberta government is ending the supervised drug consumption services at Edmonton’s Royal Alexandra Hospital (RAH) next month, with critics saying the move will put Albertans at risk.

The province’s Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction confirmed to CityNews it will be closing the site in mid-December, replacing it with a Rapid Access Addiction Medicine (RAAM) clinic.

“Hospitals are places of healing and services provided in hospital settings should support treatment, recovery, and wellness — not perpetuate addiction,” the ministry said in an emailed statement.

The ministry says it was “difficult to justify the costs” of consumption services given the Royal Alexandra Hospital reportedly averaged 22 unique clients per month in 2024.

The new services being offered at the RAH include addiction medicine, case management, counselling, and peer support, the province says. A recovery response team will operate 24/7 “to monitor the hospital campus and surrounding area, proactively engaging with people in need of recovery-oriented services and responding to drug overdoses.”

Healthcare group Friends of Medicare warns the closure will “lead to more harm” as it accused the UCP government of taking an ideological approach to addictions care.

“This government’s ideological opposition to evidence-based, life-saving care interventions will put Albertans at unnecessary risk of avoidable drug poisoning, and put our health care systems under even more strain,” said Chris Gallaway, the group’s executive director.

“The fact is, these harm reduction services save lives. There is a wealth of research to show that we need to be providing a full spectrum of services to ensure people have timely access to the care they need, and most importantly, can live long enough to access it.”

Friends of Medicare says Alberta, including the provincial capital, “remains in a drug poisoning crisis.”

Opioid-poisoning deaths in Edmonton dropped significantly in June (39) and July (38) — the latest available figures — after hitting an all-time peak in March (88), according to provincial data.

The province says Edmonton is the only community in Alberta with more than one supervised drug consumption services site, pointing to the George Spady Centre and Radius Community Health and Healing Centre. It says it has “no plans” to close those two locations.