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7 - The council, police and health services: An impasse to solutions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2022

Daniel Briggs
Affiliation:
Universidad Europea de Valencia, Spain
Rubén Monge Gamero
Affiliation:
Universidad Europea de Valencia, Spain
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Summary

We sit down and catch up with Julia on some of the concrete stumps outside the church as one of the harm reduction workers comes down from the bus and takes a piss against it. As we move outside into the bright light, drug addicts stagger past us towards the bus to pick up breakfast. It seems warmer outside than in the freezing cold van, and to our gratitude the sun creeps out of the clouds, bringing us some welcome warmth on this bitter winter day. Behind us, next to the church, a man dressed in rags wobbles up to what seems to be the place where he sleeps, which is a series of blankets and a cardboard box. He sifts through everything and finds a syringe, after which he prepares to inject himself. As we sit and talk, a large white van parks next to us and the two thin men inside smoke heroin and cocaine from foil. Julia then tells us about police corruption, and about how some officers receive blow jobs from some of the women in the area, before we then get on to the subject of support for drug users who both live and visit Valdemingómez. As we anticipated, she praises the 365-day service of the harm reduction bus that turns up around 10am and leaves at 6pm, but with one critique:

Daniel: So what other forms of help are there apart from the harm reduction team?

Julia: Well, there is Remar.

Daniel: What is that?

Julia: Food, no one else brings food, Fridays they come, those Christians, and give us dinner, clothes, but the people that really help us are the harm reduction team who are like saviours to us. But I also think they are doing it badly, like many times when I’ve been talking to them, I say it because they are accommodating us. I mean, if they weren't here, we wouldn't eat, we wouldn't have breakfast, or anything, and I am grateful to these people. Some time ago, I was a thin 53 kilos but now I am 68 again because I am able to eat, they give me food.

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Dead-End Lives
Drugs and Violence in the City Shadows
, pp. 167 - 202
Publisher: Bristol University Press
Print publication year: 2017

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