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Tribe seeks to dispense care, dispose of stigmas with Juneau’s first Community Health Vending Machine
- Mark Sabbatini
- 58 minutes ago
- 3 min read
Overdose and hygiene kits, HIV self-tests, condoms, locally prepared tea leaves, and more available for free in Tlingit and Haida’s downtown healing center
By Mark Sabbatini
Juneau Independent
For someone without money or courage to ask for intensely personal items such as an HIV self-test or drug overdose kit, a new Community Health Vending Machine downtown aims to address their needs.
The vending machine, the first of its kind in Juneau, was installed a month ago in the lobby of the Edward K. Thomas Building and received a ceremonial unveiling Tuesday. Among the items it dispenses free are Narcan kits, condoms, personal hygiene kits, medical storage and disposal containers — and packages of Hudson Bay tea leaves prepared by local tribal members, making this machine unique compared to hundreds of others across the country.
"I actually refilled it this morning," said Bettyann Carlos, a behavioral health aide for Tlingit and Haida's Community and Behavioral Services Healing Center, in an interview after the ceremony. "The opioid prevention kits have been used very frequently. The hygiene kits, they took them all."
About 70 people have taken items since the machine was installed in the building where the tribal healing center is located, Carlos said. Over time the hope is to add more local cultural items as well, such as beading kits.
The machine at Tlingit and Haida’s healing center was provided through a partnership with the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, which is also providing a machine to Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium to be installed at a Mendenhall Valley location at a future date, Carlos said.
A major goal of such vending machines is removing stigmas and barriers for people needing vital health items, said Chalyee Éesh Richard Peterson, president of Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.
"I had somebody say, ‘Why are we celebrating this? It’s like we're celebrating all the bad in a way,’" he said during the ceremony. "And I'm like, ‘No, this is us celebrating healing. This is let's remove the stigma of trauma, mental health, addiction.’ Let's remove those and hold each other up, and that's exactly what this machine does."
About 40 tribal officials and other people attended the 30-minute ceremony. Near the end, a paddle was passed around the room in a symbolic showing of the tribe’s culture of community support, with each person expressing a single word about the vending machine’s purpose such as "forward," "culture," "peace," "community," "healing," "family," "inclusion" and "recovery."
The machine is available to anyone in Juneau — resident or visitor — during the building’s regular hours (8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays, and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Fridays).
The weekday business hours access limits what advocates say is another key benefit of the machines.
“The main advantage of these vending machines is that they're available and accessible 24/7,” Philip Chan, Rhode Island Department of Health's consultant medical director, told The Nation's Health in an article published in April. “They're really being used to complement existing services.”
A two-year pilot study of five machines in Rhode Island found 28% of machine use happened over the weekend and more than half at night, according to a study cited by the publication.
• Contact Mark Sabbatini at editor@juneauindependent.com or (907) 957-2306.
