Improving Health of Homeless Alcoholics in San Francisco Through Alcohol Purchase Program

Homeless alcoholics are receiving alcohol on the taxpayer’s dime in San Francisco, California, to the tune of $5 million every year.

The city provides the substance to addicts as part of a “managed alcohol program,” according to multiple outlets, including the U.K.’s Daily Mail and the San Francisco Chronicle. The objective of the initiative is providing residents with alcohol in a manner that helps to break their addiction.

Alice Moughamian, a nurse manager for the program, touted the benefits it offers to “clients” in a video presentation that was shared Friday by another user on X.

San Francisco’s managed alcohol program provides homeless alcoholics with housing, meals, activities (including crafts and outings to Giants games), and a quantity of alcoholic beverages determined by their “need and desire,” with no expectation of reducing consumption. With a… pic.twitter.com/2lsuwKzbOG

— Laura Powell (@LauraPowellEsq) May 10, 2024

“What makes a managed alcohol program unique is that we actually provide measured and regulated doses of beverage alcohol, usually in the form of vodka or beer, to people with severe alcohol use disorder,” she commented.

Lead physician Dr. Tanya Majumder further cited the program’s commitment to the “autonomy” of chronic, severe alcoholics in the same presentation.

Here the lead physician for SF’s managed alcohol program (MAP) explains how they justify giving alcohol to alcoholics ethically. They simply do not consider abstaining from alcohol as a possibility. Instead, they allow patients to exercise “autonomy” by making their own choices. pic.twitter.com/TPVjswpwe5

— Laura Powell (@LauraPowellEsq) May 11, 2024

The program operates within the confines of a converted hotel. Nurses offer vodka, beer, and other beverages multiple times per day in accordance with the needs of each homeless person.

Adam Nathan, who chairs the Salvation Army’s advisory board in San Francisco and leads a technology company, described seeing kegs set up to provide the afflicted with free beer.

The location is an old hotel in SOMA. Inside the lobby, they had a kegs set up to taps where they were basically giving out free beer to the homeless who’ve been identified with AUD (Alcohol Use Disorder).

— Adam Nathan • blaze.ai (@adampnathan) May 8, 2024

Alcoholics are invited to obtain drinks from a program nurse as many as four times each day, according to the Daily Mail.

Majumder said during her presentation that the initiative emphasizes “patient preference” over “physician preference.”

The program started in 2020, according to Yahoo, when homeless people were allowed to stay in hotels amid the spread of COVID.

The capacity of the program has since doubled. The city now offers 20 beds in the former hotel.

San Francisco Mayor London Breed has criticized her city’s use of safe injection sites, in which drug users receive clean needles and are allowed to take the substances under controlled conditions.

The mayor slammed the so-called strategy of harm reduction as “not reducing harm” in February, according to the San Francisco Standard.