Philadelphia

Expect Legal Action If Philadelphia Opens Safe Injection Sites, U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Says

U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein says the federal government will take swift and aggressive legal action if Philadelphia and other cities open supervised injection sites for illegal drug users.

Rosenstein made the comments in a Wednesday interview with WHYY. U.S. Department of Justice officials had previously declined to comment on the sites that Philadelphia and about a dozen other jurisdictions are considering in response to the opioid crisis, other than to say they would be illegal.

Philadelphia officials announced in January they want to open safe havens where people can inject drugs, an effort to combat skyrocketing opioid overdoses in the city.

Philadelphia has the highest opioid death rate of any large U.S. city. More than 1,200 people fatally overdosed in the city in 2017, one-third more than 2016.

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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