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The heavily misleading ban on smoking and e-cigarettes in the Philadelphia City-funded drug treatment program (including outdoor spaces) was finally lifted.

The ban was passed in 2018 and was implemented by the city's Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual Disability Services (DBHIdS) in 2019. It is applicable to 80 inpatient drug treatment programs, including 9 drug treatment facilities, 32 short-term and 31 long-term rehabilitation programs, and 8 midway stations.

After years of defending its policy as evidence-based-by citing research showing that helping people to quit and stay quit can improve their chances of recovering from substance use disorders in response to critics-how does DBHIdS explain its transformation?

The department did not provide an explanation. Instead, its commissioner, Dr. Gil Bowen, said in an interview, “I think it was never intended to be a ban.”

seriously? Bowen’s comments are purely sophistry. A press release issued by DBHIdS in December 2018 stated that “Philadelphia bans smoking in drug treatment programs” and this story was reported by mainstream media. As of the time of publication, DBHIdS did not respond to Filter's request for comment.

pic.twitter.com/f3CnVO7zMq

— Brooke M Feldman (@BrookeM_Feldman), November 15, 2021

From the beginning, the harm reduction community has opposed the ban and publicly protested. The main concern is that bans on smoking and e-cigarettes will prevent nicotine users from receiving treatment.

Social worker and activist Brook Feldman is one of the strongest opponents of the ban. He wrote in the filter, "...when the street drug supply contaminated by illegal fentanyl makes Philadelphia's drug use risk more than ever Whenever it is high, it puts forward the barriers to treatment initiation. In this unprecedented drug-related death, the goal should be to remove all barriers to treatment - not to create new barriers."

The drug overdose crisis is a ruthless killing machine. During the 12-month period ending in April, more than 100,000 people in the United States died from drug overdose. If methadone or buprenorphine are more readily available than fentanyl, and if access to treatment does not depend on quitting smoking, how many people are still alive today?

"This major regression in the harm reduction-oriented approach has resulted in preventable overdose deaths, re-incarceration and other drug-related harm."

Dr. Casey Bohrman, a researcher at West Chester University, worked with Angels in Motion to provide qualitative and quantitative evidence that Philadelphia’s smoking ban prevented people from seeking hospitalization. In addition, her research found that patients violated medical advice due to smoking bans, or were expelled due to smoking.

Bohrman presented this data at a meeting in July this year, and Dr. Bowen attended the meeting. The blog post knows that there is a ban, and it can have harmful effects. The saddest thing is that people died from drug overdose after refusing treatment because they could not smoke there.

Medication plans need to learn a lesson that banning nicotine is dangerous and ineffective. Instead, they need to promote the reduction of tobacco harm and support the use of safer nicotine products, such as e-cigarettes that are more effective than nicotine patches or chewing gum to quit smoking. If smokers’ nicotine needs are met, they are more likely to enter and stay in medication. This is just common sense. It can save their lives.

"In the past three years, this major regression in harm reduction-oriented methods has resulted in preventable overdose deaths, re-incarceration, and other drug-related harm," Feld Feld, co-founder of the Pennsylvania Harm Reduction Network Man told Filter.

"When someone says they want to stop using the deadly fentanyl, but they do not plan or plan to stop smoking or e-cigarettes, we need to roll out the red carpet and let that person receive treatment, as if this is a life-and-death emergency. It’s important because in Philadelphia and elsewhere, it must be."

The anti-smoking disaster in Philadelphia is just a more disgusting example of the cruel treatment suffered by drug addicts. Their lives do not seem to matter, even if they are seeking treatment.

DBHIdS and Dr. Bowen need to admit that the policies they implemented caused great harm and were held accountable.

Photo courtesy of Brook Feldman

Helen is the senior editor of Filter. She has written articles on nicotine, mental health, and drug policy for publications such as Al Jazeera, AlterNet, Harper's, and The Influence. As an LCSW, she works with drug users in medical and community mental health settings. As an expert on tobacco harm reduction, she provides training and counseling on mental health, nicotine use and THR, and organized the first tobacco harm reduction conference in the United States in 2016. Helen is also a documentary filmmaker.

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