New dispensing machines will use handprint technology to deliver harm reduction supplies in Manitoba

Harm reduction supplies will soon be more readily available in select areas of Winnipeg through dispensing machines that can identify people by the palm of their hand.

Keewatinohk Inniniw Minoayawin, an organization that works to improve health care for northern Manitoba First Nations, has eight new dispensing machines that will be used in part to distribute harm reduction tools such as naloxone kits and clean needles, said the organization's chief executive officer. 

To start, KIM is working to locate the machines in Winnipeg and Churchill and maybe a few communities in between, said Dr. Barry Lavallee.

"It gives an individual … a real sense of independence in keeping themselves safe and living safely. That's really the whole purpose of harm reduction," Lavallee said.

"It's really using a technology to support people in a harm reduction way."

The machines work by using someone's palm identity to allow them to gain access to certain slotted areas, he explained.

"There will be a variation of models that go on across Manitoba," said Lavallee. In the initial rollout, there may be differences from site to site in who has access to the machines, and the number of people who do, he said.

Manitoba has been seeing an increasing number of overdose deaths in recent years. According to data from the province's Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, 407 Manitobans died from overdoses in 2021, up from a record 372 overdose deaths in 2020.

Preliminary numbers for 2022 up to the month of December show there 377 drug-related deaths in Manitoba to that point.

While Lavallee said it's too early to say where all eight of the dispensing machines will be situated, the executive director of Winnipeg's Main Street Project said he believes his organization, which works with vulnerable people, will get two at its site.

Jamil Mahmood said the pilot will give Main Street Project an opportunity to distribute harm reduction supplies in a new and different way.

"We're pretty excited about kind of piloting them in our shelter space," he said.   

People are dying from a toxic drug supply, said Mahmood, and while naloxone can temporarily reverse an opioid overdose, the amount needed to do so has been increasing in recent years. 

"We know that it's taking more... naloxone every time," he said.