THE government has been urged to allow heroin addicts to take the Class A drug under medical supervision by Burnley MP Julie Cooper.

The Labour health spokeswoman said ‘supervised consumption rooms’ could cut overdoses, deaths and crime.

She was speaking in a special Westminster debate on drug treatment services.

Mrs Cooper told junior health minister Seema Kennedy: “While other countries move increasingly to a public health approach to drug use, the instinct in the UK is to criminalise addicts.

“Both supervised consumption rooms and heroin-assisted treatments are possible ways to effect some positive changes. Supervised consumption rooms reduce the risk of disease transmission, prevent overdose and also present an opportunity to refer users to appropriate addiction services.

“Heroin-assisted treatment allows for the provision of pharmacological heroin to dependent individuals who have not responded to other treatments, and involves patients receiving heroin in a clinical setting from a doctor under strict controls.

“That has many benefits. It reduces the use of street heroin, which can be of dubious quality and variable strength. It takes away the need for criminal drug dealers, who are preying on vulnerable people and profiting from their addictions. It gets addicts into treatment. It stops desperate addicts resorting to criminal activity to fund their addiction. It improves access to recovery services, HIV treatments and services to address adverse life circumstances. As the police remind us, it also stops drug-taking in open spaces in the community and protects the wider public from contact with used needles.”

Mrs Kennedy told her: “You talked about the international evidence that drug consumption rooms can be effective at addressing public nuisance issues and health risks for users and for the wider public. There is a risk that such facilities would be introduced at the expense of other more relevant, evidence-based drug services for local areas. There is currently no legal framework for the provision of drug consumption rooms.”

Mrs Cooper said afterwards: “I am not advocating the legalisation of Class A drugs but proposing treatment for addicts rather than criminalisation.”