Health Canada has approved four supervised drug consumption sites in Edmonton and one site in Lethbridge, the Alberta government announced Wednesday.
Three Edmonton sites will be operated by Access to Medically Supervised Injection Services Edmonton (AMSISE) at the Boyle McCauley Health Centre, Boyle Street Community Services and the George Spady Centre.
Alberta Health Services will operate an in-patient program at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton starting next spring. This will be the first hospital-based program in North America.
The three community-based sites in Edmonton will open by late 2017 or early 2018.
ARCHES will run the consumption site in downtown Lethbridge. It will be open in early 2018.
The Calgary site at the Sheldon M. Shumir Centre is expected to receive federal approval by the end of October.
So far this year, 315 people have died from fentanyl-related overdoses in Alberta.