Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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583. To ask the Minister for Health the status of the establishment of a medically supervised injecting centre in County Dublin; the status of the relevant legislation; if he plans to establish such centres outside of County Dublin; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6182/16]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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On 15 of December 2015, the Government decided to include additional Heads in the Misuse of Drugs (Amendment) Bill to provide enabling provisions for supervised injecting facilities. This provisions would enable the Minister for Health to issue licences permitting the establishment of supervised injecting facilities to provide enhanced clinical support to, and mitigate the problem of public injecting by, chronic drug users.

Drafting of the Bill by the Office of Parliamentary Counsel is at an advanced stage and, subject to approval by Government, it is anticipated that it will be published in coming months.

In the event of the planned legislation becoming law, it is envisaged that initially one supervised injecting facility would be established on a pilot basis in Dublin city centre. An independent evaluation would be an intrinsic element to this initiative; determining the utility, safety and cost-effectiveness of the supervised injecting facility in an Irish context. The outcome of such an evaluation will inform any decision to licence further facilities. In line with the experience of other countries which have established such facilities, it would be expected that the numbers would be few and the locations carefully selected to address most effectively the requirements and concerns of the service users and the wider community.