A year after the province shot down a plan by non-profit Northern Detox Programs Inc. to establish a non-medical detox at the old Addictions Foundation of Manitoba (AFM) Polaris Building B facility at 23 Nickel Rd., the group is still pushing for a detox, but this time hopes to see it built new in the Princeton Drive area.

Randy Patrick, city manager, said July 14 that Gary Ceppetelli, director of planning and community development, is following up with Manitoba Housing on the idea, as there is a residential component to detox and post-detox needs of clients.

Coun. Oswald Sawh, chair of Northern Detox Programs Inc., said July 17 the “operational budget is still being reviewed by treasury board,” but “capital has been approved through Housing.”

“The operational budget needs to be approved through Health or it’s not a go,” Sawh said.

The issue was discussed June 25 at the development and review committee with the minutes noting, "Waiting on details from Manitoba Housing – Gary (Ceppetelli) to follow-up.”

Citing the recession and need to recoup some money by selling the old property to help defray part of the $9.3 million cost of building the new Addictions Foundation of Manitoba (AFM) treatment centre at 90 Princeton Dr., former healthy living Minister Kerri Irvin-Ross said “no” to retrofitting the Nickel Road site last summer.

The old AFM site served about 700 clients a year there with alcohol, drug and gambling addictions. In 2001, the legislative assembly approved a new AFM regional addictions treatment centre for Thompson. It took eight years for the project to come to fruition. The residential treatment program runs for 26 days and has 18 beds. About 70 per cent of the clients at the old AFM Nickel Road site were aboriginal.

Interestingly, Irvin-Ross is now the minister of housing and community development.

One of the sites being looked at for a brand-new purpose-built detox is adjacent to the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba (AFM) treatment centre on Princeton Drive.

Sawh noted earlier to enrol in AFM day programs, or enter a residential program, clients must be clean and sober. While many can do that at home within 72 hours of admission, others need more support and can take longer, hence the need for a separate detox facility, Sawh says.

Withdrawal management in advance of admission, said Sawh, can be no small feat for anyone, but particularly someone who is perhaps homeless and lacks a positive family support network.

Medically risky detoxifications such as alcohol withdrawal in severe cases of alcoholism where stopping cold turkey could be dangerous to the point of causing delirium tremens ("trembling madness" in Latin), also known colloquially as the "DTs," or other serious cases of barbiturate and benzodiazepine tranquillizer withdrawal, would still need to be carried out at Thompson General Hospital, but many clients, including almost all opiate addicts looking to clean up, could be managed in a so- called non-medical detox.

Sawh said clients emerging from the 26-day AFM residential treatment program on Thompson Drive, often have no transitional housing to go to, making their chance of relapse high and squandering resources used for treatment. Investing in post-treatment transitional housing is essential, Sawh said.

Cecile Gousseau, a management consultant in the healthcare field from Winnipeg, who completed a feasibility study Dec. 22, 2008 for Northern Detox Programs Inc., estimated the cost of retrofitting the old AFM building for use as a detox at between $2.6 million and $4.3 million.

Annual operating costs there would have amount to about $1.4 million, Sawh said, although that would be partially offset by operational revenues. The cost of building a new facility as a detox is estimated at between $6 million and $7.3 million, Sawh said.

The detox feasibility study proposed a four-bed observation room where clients would be admitted initially followed by a move to one of 16 program beds with an average stay of 10 days.

The AFM experience here has been that that the population entering treatment is approximately 50 per cent female and 50 per cent male."

Gousseau said she would expect a "similar gender distribution" for a detox.

The current reality, Sawh said, is that people are detoxing often in the Thompson RCMP drunk tank or holding cells or the Thompson Homeless Shelter.

The federal government indicated last year it might be willing to pony up about $500,000 in infrastructure costs for a Thompson detox, Sawh said, but likely not without some commitment, he added, of matching funds from the Government of Manitoba, likely in the area of ongoing operating costs.