Our North Bay Healthbox

The next time you're near our North Bay office, check out Our North Bay Healthbox!

Our North Bay Healthbox is a vending machine you can use to get free health and wellness items you need and may otherwise not have access to.

More than a traditional vending machine, Our North Bay Healthbox goes beyond item dispensing to provide you with:

Health promotion messaging

Drug alerts

A directory of local health and wellness support services

Our Healthbox was born out of a three-year research project led by REACH Nexus to improve access to HIV self-testing and other health supplies, and to connect people to health and social care.

How it works

Our North Bay Healthbox is used in person at the corner of Oak St. W and Cassells St., next to the community sharps bin. When you arrive, the Healthbox will already be on and ready to use.

Local health and social service information can be found without having to create a profile or sign in. To get an item, set up a free user profile by choosing a year, a colour and an avatar. No personal or identifying information is needed.

Once you set up your profile, the box will ask you questions about your health status and other relevant questions. Your answers are kept anonymous. You can skip questions if you wish.

After going through the questions, choose an item from the options provided, and collect the item from the opening.

The box will ask you to provide feedback on your experience with the box. This is optional.

When you are done using the box, sign out of your account.

Street-view image of Our North Bay Healthbox

Tackling the Opioid Crisis in Northern Ontario

"It’s more than just a service – it’s a step toward providing equitable access to the resources people need to stay safe, healthy, and supported."

Frequently Asked Questions

Items

What items can I get from our North Bay Healthbox?

Harm Reduction Supplies

Sharps Containers
Naloxone Kits and Refills
Safe Sex Kits
HIV Self-Test Kits

Hygiene Products

Shower Kits
Menstrual Kits
Oral Hygiene Kits
Hand Hygiene Kits

Safer Substance Use Supplies

Injection Kits (long and short)

Crystal Meth Kits
Straight Stems Kits
Foil Kits

Other

Wound Care Kits
Socks
Foil Blankets (seasonal item)*
Ponchos (seasonal item)*
Gloves and handwarmers (seasonal item)**
Water Bottle (seasonal item)**

*Interchanges depending on the season (cold weather and warm weather)
**Interchanges depending on the season (cold weather and warm weather)

How did you select which items to offer in Our North Bay Healthbox?

Items in Our North Bay Healthbox are chosen based on community needs and aim to address existing service gaps. At the Health Unit, we understand these needs based on population data we collect and through our working relationships with community partners.

Are there limits to how many items people can get from Our North Bay Healthbox?

There are limits set for some items to allow equitable access for as many community members as possible.

Our Healthbox items are also available in our Needle Syringe Program office, along with other harm reduction supplies, and can be accessed during our regular business hours (8:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Monday to Friday).

Community Impact

Why is Our North Bay Healthbox in my community?

Our North Bay Healthbox responds to various needs within the community and will be available to all residents of North Bay who would benefit from accessing health and wellness supplies.

There are a few key considerations behind the decision to bring our Healthbox to North Bay:

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, our Health Unit region had an average of 14 opioid-related deaths per 100,000 people. During the pandemic, that number more than doubled to 36.4 deaths per 100,000. The number of opioid-related deaths has remained relatively high and steady throughout the years since the pandemic (Ontario Drug Policy Research Network).

This highlights the urgent need for innovative and supportive strategies to help reduce opioid-related deaths, overdoses, and other harms.

2.Our North Bay Healthbox provides low-barrier, equitable and stigma-free access to naloxone kits and safer substance-use supplies, helping to save lives at all hours of the day.

The Healthbox offers essential services to those who need them after hours, on weekends and on holidays when other services are otherwise unavailable.

What needs does our North Bay Healthbox address?

1) Equitable access to important health supplies

Our Healthbox provides low-barrier and stigma-free access to harm reduction supplies and personal health products for people with complex health and social needs, and anyone else who needs them.

These supplies will address needs related to safe sex, HIV testing, Naloxone, wound care, seasonal threats, personal hygiene and comfort.

2) Communication and connection

Our North Bay Healthbox serves as a vehicle for health promotion messaging, drug alerts, and connects people to local health and wellness support services via its local service directory and service navigation map.

3) Fills Gap with After-Hour Service

North Bay does not currently have an after-hours needle syringe program. Our Healthbox fills this gap in services and responds to the voices of people with lived experience, operating 24/7/365.

Will Our North Bay Healthbox help to reduce overdoses within the community?

Naloxone is a non-addictive, non-psychoactive drug that blocks the effects of opioids on the body. It does not create a high. Naloxone temporarily reverses the effects of an opioid overdose.

Naloxone is available at the Health Unit, during our business hours, to individuals who are at risk of experiencing an overdose, to friends and family of individuals who are at risk of experiencing an overdose and to individuals who have recently been incarcerated.

Naloxone is available to dispense from Our North Bay Healthbox, from 4:30 pm to 8:30 am on weekdays, 24 hours on the weekend and 24 hours during holidays.

Individuals will therefore have access to Naloxone all hours of the day and can access it if/when needed.

Will Our North Bay Healthbox contribute to more sharps being found on the ground?

Safe sharps handling and disposal is an important part of harm reduction services.Disposal containers and community sharps bins are available for these purposes. Community safety is a community effort.

Sharps containers are available to dispense from Our North Bay Healtbox.The Healthbox is also located next to a community sharps bin for ease of safe sharps disposal.

For more information, visit our sharps page.

Are community partners involved in Our North Bay Healthbox?

Yes!

We have partnered with the Peer Outreach Support Team (POST) at True Self-Debwewendizwin to ensure their clients have access to safer substance use supplies, harm reduction supplies, personal hygiene supplies, as well as health and wellness supplies from Our North Bay Healthbox.

POST assists individuals in the community with immediate needs, providing peer support around mental health, substance use, and access to essential resources, including harm reduction supplies and referrals to community agencies. POST will be supporting us by restocking Healthbox items when we are closed.

Many other community organizations and services have agreed to be listed within the Healthbox’s local service directory and service navigation map. These resources allow community members to scroll through a list of available health and social services within the community and locate them using the navigation map.

Community partners are also supporting us by promoting the North Bay Healthbox to their clients, sharing Healthbox information within their organizations (posters) and including Healthbox information in their staff newsletters.

Will the Health Unit evaluate Our North Bay Healthbox? How will we know if it is a success?

We, along with the REACH Nexus research team, will closely monitor the use of the Healthbox to determine trends, the number of times the Healthbox has been accessed, the number of people who have accessed the box and to identify areas for improvement.

The data collected through the Healthboxalso helps us further understand the needs in the community, which can help determine what health supplies are most needed.

Specific thresholds and indicators of success have been determined to measure the impact that the Healthbox is having within the community.

Safe Access

Where does my data go?

The box collects real-time, anonymous and confidential data from what you enter into the machine.This information can only be accessed by Health Unit staff and the research staff from REACH Nexus. This data helps us understand the needs in the community and contributes to the overall research project.

Who is Our North Bay Healthbox for?

Our North Bay Healthbox is for everyone in the community to use. It is user-friendly, accessible, and provides services in both French and English.

Can children access Our North Bay Healthbox?

In Canada, the minimum age for creating a profile with Our Healthbox is 16. Someone younger than 16 years could potentially create a profile to access items in the Our Healthbox. The items available in Our North Bay Healthbox do not have the potential to cause harm on their own.

Why is Our North Bay Healthbox being offered to people who use substances?

Our North Bay Healthbox is a resource for the health and wellness of all community members. Providing safer substance use equipment has been proven to prevent injury and the spread of infections such as HIV, Hepatitis B, and Hepatitis C.

We are mandated to make harm reduction supplies available to people who use substances. Best practice recommendations for Canadian harm reduction programs are followed.