The city of San Francisco is handing out bottles of beer and shots of vodka to homeless alcoholics, and the idea is causing controversy.
The alcoholic drinks are served by nurses as part of the city’s managed alcohol program, which has been running for four years, as a way to care for vulnerable homeless people.
The program, portrayed as the shot in the arm the city needs, is intended to curb the amount of alcohol homeless people drink. It still gives them some options, but in a more controlled way, in the hope of curbing their addiction in a controlled manner.
Nurses assess patients and typically serve them the equivalent of 1-2 drinks – doling out 1.7 ounces of vodka or liquor (about a shot), 5 ounces of wine (1 glass), or 12 ounces of beer – three to four times a day. about three quarters of a pint.
Experts involved with the program say it has actually helped keep homeless alcoholics out of hospitals and prisons and even prevented them from dying.
San Francisco’s managed alcohol program provides beer and vodka shots to homeless alcoholics as part of a harm reduction strategy and operates out of this former hotel
The program, which will run for four years, aims to reduce excessive alcohol consumption among homeless people while preventing hospitalizations and deaths
Despite criticism for enabling addiction, officials claim it saves money by reducing the use of emergency services. The photo shows a homeless man on the sidewalk
Before the program was set up, those who drank too much alcohol were among the highest users of emergency services in the city.
The program has doubled in size since its inception in 2020. While there were initially 10 beds available for those suffering from alcoholism, 20 beds are now available on the site of a disused hotel in the Tenderloin District.
But that comes at a price: The city puts $5 million a year into the program, while nurses serve shots of vodka and beer several times a day, based on “patient”-specific health care plans.
The focus is not so much on ensuring that participants become completely sober, but on improving their overall health step by step.
While the program may bring some cheer to the homeless community, some residents appear to have only recently heard of the city’s efforts and believe the taxpayer-funded program is a waste of money.
UCSF School of Nursing professor Shannon Smith-Bernardin helped establish the program in San Francisco
Adam Nathan, CEO of an AI company and chairman of the San Francisco Salvation Army advisory board, noted that drugs are not given out to drug addicts and therefore questions why alcohol would be given to alcoholics.
‘I find it all very strange and it just doesn’t feel right. Providing free medications to drug addicts does not solve their problems. It just stretches them. Where is the recovery in all this?’, Nathan posted on X.
The program’s rationale is based on harm reduction, reducing the negative health consequences of alcohol and drug use, rather than eliminating such vices completely.
Homelessness and overdose deaths have plagued the city in recent years, but critics argue such programs only allow addictions to fester.
The Salvation Army, which insists on complete abstinence from alcohol, has ridiculed the city for devoting public funds to the initiative.
Even San Francisco Mayor London Breed appears to be at odds with her own public health department, believing that harm reduction techniques don’t actually reduce harm, but make things much worse.
“Are we going to control people’s addictions forever with our taxpayers’ money? It seems like that’s basically what we’re saying,” Tom Wolf, who is in recovery from heroin addiction, told police. San Francisco Chronicle. “I think we should spend that money on detoxing and recovery.”
But a professor at the UCSF School of Nursing, Shannon Smith-Bernardin, who helped create the program in San Francisco, explained how the goal is to stabilize the amount of alcohol used by homeless people “so they don’t binge.” -drink or stop drinking and have seizures, and then… start figuring out what’s next.’
In addition to pouring the pints and serving the shots, the program also offers participants the opportunity to receive medication and therapy to reduce alcohol cravings.
Nathan took the program to his social media feed earlier this week, posting details of what he discovered after walking into the former hotel where the scheme took place. He was shocked by what he had seen.
‘I am not a doctor or an ‘expert’ in the field of drug policy. But I’m a taxpayer. When was this Managed Alcohol Program approved? Where were the public hearings? Why is it hidden in an old hotel? Who approved a $2 million budget for it?” Nathan asked at X.
Even San Francisco’s woke mayor, London Breed, seems to disagree with her own public health department, believing that harm reduction techniques don’t actually reduce harm, but make things much worse.
“While there are some limited studies that show some promise, I have to highlight a few things that concern me,” Nathan continued.
‘1. The Department of Health is spending $2 million of taxpayer money to provide free alcohol to mostly homeless people struggling with alcoholism.
‘2. It’s set up so that people in the program just walk in and grab a beer, and then another. All day,” he explained.
Public health officials have defended the program, insisting that Nathan’s tweets only served to mislead the public and misrepresent the program.
Aside from wasting public money, public health officials in San Francisco emphasize that the alcohol management program actually saved the city $1.7 million over a six-month period in what would otherwise have been emergency room visits or hospital stays.
Officials say visits to the city’s sobering center are down 92 percent, while emergency room visits are down more than 70 percent.