PHILADELPHIA — Many people living on the streets in Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood — the largest open-air drug market on the East Coast — are in full-blown addiction, openly snorting, smoking or injecting illicit drugs, hunched over crates or on stoops. Syringes litter sidewalks, and the stench of urine fouls the air.
The neighborhood’s afflictions date to the early 1970s, when industry left and the drug trade took hold. With each new wave of drugs, the situation grows grimmer. Now, with the arrival of xylazine, a veterinary tranquilizer, new complications are burdening an already overtaxed system.
“It’s all hands on deck,” said Dave Malloy, a longtime Philadelphia social worker who does mobile outreach in Kensington and around the city.
