UNDUN
Unified Networkers of Drug Users Nationally
Quebec intends to establish safer injection sites
Given the recent favourable court ruling in B.C. which established safer injection sites as a fundamental health right for injection drug users (a ruling now under appeal by the federal government) the Quebec provincial government is considering opening a number of smaller safer injection sites throughout the province.
Quebec is envisioning truly community based safer injection sites, possibly as an add-on to existing needle exchange services, rather than the highly expensive inSite facility which exists in Vancouver.
... health officials in Quebec say they are preparing to open a safe injection site in Montreal in coming months, and there could be many more to follow in the province...
Quebec has already embraced harm reduction strategies to combat the ills of drug abuse. The province boasts nearly 800 needle exchange locations. [Public Health Minister] Poirier said establishing safe injection sites was the logical next step.
"We can't do this in hiding without saying or announcing anything," Poirier said. "The public has to be aware that this is one step more. We'll probably start in Montreal, then look at Quebec City's downtown area," Poirier said. "We haven't ruled out other cities being chosen. We would like to have sites where they are justified by the need."
Danish Drug Users Memorial Day July 21, 2008
The Danish Drug Users Union (BrugerForeningen) hold an annunal Remembrance Day for the Victims of the War on Drugs every July in Copenhagen. A couple hundred people gathered to remember friends and loved ones who have died as a result of the problematic manner in which substances are regarded contemporarily, most particularly, the prohibition context.
This year a memorial speech was given by Mat Southwell, a long-time user activist from the U.K.
The Danish Drug Users Union will be hosting an International Drug Users' Day (IDUD2008) event in Copenhagen this coming November. The previous IDUD was in 2003 and attended by 96 people from some 16 countries. Their website carries a report from that 2003 event.
B.C. Judge Rules in favour of inSiteIllicit Drug Users have right to Health Care
A significant legal victory was won by VANDU, the Portland Hotel Society, and two drug users, Dean Wilson and Shelly Tomic from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside neighbourhood, regarding the right of illicit drug users to have health care in the form of a safer injection site, in particular, inSite.
B.C. Supreme Court judge Mr. Justice Pitfield provided his reasons for ruling on May 26 in Vancouver. In his ruling, Judge Pitfield stated that health facilities for users of illicit drugs shall no longer require a federal exemption regarding the using of illicit drugs at such health facilities provided the drugs are being used within a health care regime. The implication being that a safer injection site is a health care facility for illicit drug users and therefore it should be able to operate without requiring the explicit permission of the federal government in being granted an exemption from the Controlled Drugs and Subtances Act. In fact, the judge stated that the current requirement for exemption (and denial of such) "it prohibits the management of addiction and its associated risks at Insite. It treats all consumption of controlled substances, whether addictive or not, and whether by an addict or not, in the same manner. Instead of being rationally connected to a reasonable apprehension of harm, the blanket prohibition contributes to the very harm it seeks to prevent. It is inconsistent with the state’s interest in fostering individual and community health, and preventing death and disease." (p.56, Pitfield Ruling)
Obviously this ruling opens the way for other safer injection sites to be opened in other communities since it was not limited in scope to inSite only, but in general regarding drug users right to appropriate health services per se. Unfortunately this ruling flies in the face of the current federal government's ideology which is opposed to harm reduction facilities such as safer injection sites. The current government favours traditional abstinance-based treatment programs and increased prevention initiatives such as more "just say no!" campaigns aimed at youth - and of course, increased repression of drugs overall in the form of Bill C-26 which intends to increase manditory sentences for persons convicted of drug offenses.
The legal victory won with the inSite ruling is very significant, and accordingly, the federal Health Minister Tony Clement has announced it will be appealled by the federal government. If overturned, then the government will be able to immediately close inSite by refusing to grant another period of exemption. On the other hand, if the B.C. Appeals Court were to uphold the Pitfield ruling then it would provide a strong green light for the opening of more safer injection sites across Canada.
Impressive Organizing in Asia Asian Consortium on Drug Use, HIV/AIDS and Poverty
For the first time in Asia, 400 HIV/AIDS service providers, Injecting Drug Users (IDU), parliamentarians and policy makers from 27 countries gathered for the Asian Consultation on Prevention of HIV Related to Drug Use organized by the Asian Consortium on Drug Use, HIV/AIDS and Poverty in Goa, India on 28-31 January. The meeting reviewed the existing shortcomings in drug policies, and presented viable solutions to prevent HIV among IDUs.
Visit this website to read about efforts of Asian drug user groups to work with parliamentarians and policy makers to develop effective harm reduction for an estimated 7.5 million IDUs in a region with staggering rates of HIV. In Asia, up to 89% of new HIV and 92% of hepatitis C infections are occurring among injecting drug users (IDUs). On average IDUs account for 30-50% of new HIV infections and 40-60% of the IDU population is estimated to be living with hepatitis C virus (HCV) as well.
On this occasion the International Network of People Who Use Drugs for the Asia and Pacific region issued a call to governments, various agencies, organisations and the general public to support in "empowering our communities to advocate and protect our rights and to facilitate meaningful participation in decision making on issues affecting us."
The Goa Declaration also requests support in promoting a better understanding of current drug policies that negatively impact on the lives and rights of people who use drugs, their families and communities. It calls for acknowledging and enhancing knowledge and skills to educate and train others, particularly peers and members of the community.
"Through collective action, we will challenge existing oppressive drug laws, policies and programmes and work with government and our constituents to formulate evidence-based drug polices that respect human rights and dignity of people who use drugs," the Goa Declaration states. LINK
Read the full Goa Declaration as issued by the International Network of People Who Use Drugs for the Asia and Pacific region, January 2008.
Teens Using Computer Cleaning Air for Buzz
A Calgary Police Officer warns of the dangers of dusting following the death of his 15 year of son. Dusting is the inhalation of compressed cans of air which is used to blow out dust from the inside of computers.
INPUD statement to UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs Vienna, Austria, March 13, 2008
Stijn Goossens, representing INPUD (International Network of People Who Use Drugs) made a statement to the opening plenary of the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs. This is a big achievement as user activists have been struggling for years to be able to address this powerful body which plays a pivotal role in maintaining prohibitionist drug policy at an international level. Only recently did this Commission recommend that the safer injection site in Vancouver be closed.
Stijn's statement is reproduced in the International Harm Reduction Association's HR2 blog. It was co-written by Stijn from Belgium and Luiz Guanabara from Brazil. Here is a bit of what was said in the statement:
Civil Society organizations have an important contribution to make in this area of policy. Civil society involvement can help to improve the policy discussions and help governments to engage with, and have the direct and valuable input from, representatives of organizations of people who use drugs, academics, drug policy analysts, farmers organizations and so on...
We believe that the Commission and the other institutions of drug control would greatly benefit from the involvement of People who use drugs as part of the civil society engagement in the process of drugs policy making:
- To work together for improvement and to make more cost-effective the treatment and harm reduction measures for people who use drugs.
- To cooperate closely together in the global fight against AIDS, Hepatitis C and other blood born diseases.
- To avoid peoples unnecessary dying.
- To avoid the unnecessary, but socially harmful and expensive incarceration of people just because of the consumption of drugs that are considered to be illegal.
- To cooperate closely together in the fight against the criminalization, stigma, discrimination and marginalization of people who use drugs and to work together for social inclusion and health.
- And to avoid violations of the human rights of people who use drugs.
You can also view a video of INPUD's presentation to the 51st session of the Commission on Narcotic Drugs at HardCoreHarmReducer's dRUGwARLog
Challenging UN Drug Policy Conventions Beyond 2008 Conference (UN sponsored), Vancouver, February 2008
Craig Jones, Executive Director, the John Howard Society of Canada, gave a speech on Feb. 5 wherein he challenged the UN Drug Policy Conventions, saying they are "harm maximization":
Prohibition, as required by the Conventions, is a policy choice to criminalize large numbers of otherwise law-abiding people and to thereby provoke into flourishing a global criminal underworld. It is the cure that is worse than the disease. Prohibition is not a law of nature - like gravity -- it's a dysfunctional and destructive form of harm maximization that benefits only organized crime and police agencies.The entirety of Mr. Jone's comments can be found in Transform Drug Policy Foundation's blog post of February 25.
Wave One Outcome Evaluation Report OHRDP Survey
Wave One analysis of data collected by needle exchange programs at 39 sites throughout Ontario for the Ontario Harm Reduction Distribution Project (OHRDP) has been completed.
This massive survey project is headed by the HIV Prevention Research Team of the Epidimology and Community Medicine Departemtn of the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ontario.
For Wave One UNDUN members undertook questioning of 70 injection drug users in the Fall of 2006 on behalf of the needle exchange program of the Hastings and Prince Edward Counties Public Health Unit. UNDUN did the survey questioning of 70 IDUs for Wave Two (Spring 2007) and Wave Three (Fall 2007) as well.
The results of Wave One analysis are now available. Results are compiled for the entire province combined, as well as individually for each of the 39 survey sites. You can get a sense of the comprehensiveness of the survey by looking over the Wave One Outcome Evaluation Baseline Report covering the 70 IDUs interviewed on behalf of the Hastings and Prince Edward Counties Public Health Unit.
View the Wave One Report here.
Initiative to education Canadian Prime Minister about harm reduction and drug policy reform
With one informative email every week, drug policy researcher Dr. Susan Boyd will be attempting to education Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper. The public is invited to send their own emails as well. You can view the contents of each weekly email at the website Educating Harper
Mission Impossible?
February 4th Lobbying of Canadian MPs for a Sensible Drug Policy
February 4th the Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy and others will be meeting with Members of Parliament throughout the day to discuss how drug use is a health issue not a criminal justice issue and asking for harm reduction to be put back into the new Anti-Drug Strategy. After educating MPs on the importance of sensible changes to Canada's Drug Policy, there will also be an evening panel on Parliament Hill from 5-7pm.
NGO Committee on Narcotic Drugs
The Vienna NGO Committee on Narcotic Drugs (website) helps to contribute to a worldwide effort to provide a unique and important platform on which civil society can contribute to the reflection on the 1998-2008 United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Illicit Drugs. The Vienna NGO Committee is an organization that provides a vital link between NGO's, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND).
There is a North American consultation for the Vienna NGO Committee taking place in Vancouver on February 4th and 5th by invitation only. However, you can help contribute to this important work by filling in an Online Survey
Drug Users Charter
The Lifeline Project is a British based organization which has been active in the harm reduction field for nearly 35 years.
Recently it published a Drug Users Charter by Dr. Richard Newcombe which outlines 10 specific rights for drug users.
Check out the Drug Users Charter here
Buprenorphine - alternative to methadone to hit Canadian market
A new heroin-addiction treatment that many doctors say is safer than methadone can be prescribed in Canada starting this week [November 20, 2007].
The drug, sold under the names Subutex and Suboxone, contains buprenorphine, an opiate. Manufactured by Schering-Plough Corp., it was approved by Health Canada in 2005.
Dr. Mark Dube, a private practitioner in Sudbury, Ont., has been prescribing methadone for years. He started prescribing Subutex and Suboxone in August to one of his methadone patients under a special access permit granted by Health Canada.
Dube considers the drug safe. He argues the formulations to be sold in Canada contain antidotes that make using high doses unpleasant. But the medication is addictive.
According to Dr. H. Westley Clark, director of Washington, D.C.-based Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, if a drug can be abused, it will be.
"These are still opioids. It has a very good safety profile, but they are not sugar pills," he told CBC News.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration says buprenorphine is not as dangerous as crack cocaine, OxyContin and methamphetamines. But it is in the same category as Vicodin, a commonly abused painkiller.
As for the risk in Canada, each province will have to decide on its own how tightly to control it. "Across the province and at the college we're still trying to figure out what the appropriate supervision is and it's still a work in progress," said Dube.
He said he's hoping for flexible regulations, adding that strict rules would make it harder to treat patients.
The Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons warns doctors on its website that opioid-addicted patients are at a higher risk for drug and alcohol abuse, including inappropriate mixing of alcohol or other drugs with prescribed medication.
"As with any new therapy or treatment, the college expects that all physicians who wish to use buprenorphine to treat opioid-dependent patients will have training/education in this drug, and addiction medicine generally, prior to initiating buprenorphine treatment," it says.
- CBC News article
2007 World Drug Report UN Office on Drugs and Crime
This annual World Drug Report is definitely worth reading.The World Drug Report presents the most comprehensive statistical view of today's illicit drug situation. This year's edition reports signs of long-term containment of the global problem. However, the overall trend masks contrasting regional situations, which the report examines in detail. For instance, while an impressive multi-year reduction in opium poppy cultivation continued in South-East Asia, Afghanistan recorded a large increase in 2006. More interceptions of cocaine and heroin shipments across the world have played an important part in stabilizing the market. However, as we witness successes in some areas, challenges appear in others. Although drug abuse levels are stabilizing globally, countries along major and new trafficking routes, such as those now going through Africa, may face increasing levels of drug consumption. The World Drug Report 2007 also discusses a possible method to better assess and monitor the role played by organized crime in transnational drug trafficking.
What's going in with the Afghan opium production is very interesting. As the Report notes: "the country was responsible for 92 per cent of global opium production in 2006. For no other drug is production so concentrated in a single area".
You can download this 282 page report in .pdf format here
Vancouver's Safer Injection Site Needs Support Send Support Letter
After securing a one year extention last fall, INSITE, Vancouver's safer injection facility, is under threat of having to close this coming December.
The U.S. Drug Czar seems to be taking a personal interest in trying to influence the Canadian Government to not permit INSITE to operate. Therefore, it is very critical that we show our support for INSITE and let the government know that we want INSITE to continue operating.
Extensive research has demonstrated that INSITE has been effective in reducing HIV transmission, preventing overdose deaths, and even in increasing referrals to drug treatment. INSITE's success is well-understood by those who feel public policy should be guided by health-related evidence, not political agendas.
Please take the time to show your support!
UNDUN has opened its Let's Talk Forum register
UNDUN is hoping its forum will be a lively place for users, family members, user activists, people with medical training, government officials, and anyone else whose interested will participate. There are sections on a variety of substances, as well a general discussion. The forum is entitled Let's Start Talking.
Methadone Patients Against Hysteria and Further Restrictions Online Petition
Methadone Patients Against Hysteria and Further Restrictions is asking for people to please sign their online petition Anti-methadone forces in the U.S. are working to cut back the hard-fought gains which methadone advocates have made over the past three decades.
There is the potential for more restrictive guidelines in Canada as well. So it is really important that methadone patients start speaking out about how clinic policies impact upon their lives, and in particular, how difficult it is for them to get on with a new start without things like take-home doses.
IHRA's 2007 Warsaw Conference Pictures and Reports
Very interesting reports on the conference at Black Poppy's Drug Diary blog
And an excellent photo presentation of particpants at the conference.
INPUD holds first board meeting Warsaw, Poland, May 16, 2007
International drug users activists who attending IHRA's International Conference for the Reduction of Drug Related Harms in Warsaw, Poland this year also took part in the 2nd International Drug Users Congress. International Drug Users Congresses will take place annually in partnership with IHRA's international conferences.
Following the 1st International Drug Users Congress in Vancouver last year, a whole lot has been accomplished. International user activists formally united as INPUD, the International Network of People Who Use Drugs. This formation of an international body of drug users is a big step forward in our ability to give voice to our concerns in many important venues. Next, INPUD opened its website in late winter of 2007. Working agreements with the International Harm Reduction Association have been established whereby INPUD will serve in a consultative capacity to the organizers of IHRA's annual international conference. Furthermore, IHRA is providing INPUD with some basic operational expense funding for the next three years. One of the uses of such funding is to enable INPUD to run its website.
While in Warsaw,INPUD held its first board meeting on May 16, 2007. Minutes of that meeting can be found here
Pictured below are two members of the INPUD Board, Stijn (HardCoreHarmReducer) Goosins from Belgium, and speaking, Grant McNally from England. Picture was taken during the 1st Board Meeting on May 16.
International Harm Reduction Conference 2007 Warsaw, Poland May 13-17, 2007
The International Conference is taking place in Warsaw. Anually, over 2,000 international harm reductionists attend these conferences. As well, many drug user activists try to attend as specific user-driven events occur around, and within, the larger conference. In specific, users are participating in the 2nd International Drug Users Congress on May 13.
You can download the agenda for the 2nd International Drug Users Congress here
This year many international user activists are going to the conference/congress with info tech tools in hand, and will be reporting back to their home communities.
video : Stijn Goosens, international drug user activist from Belgium, provides a short history of international drug user activism at Warsaw 2007 International Harm Reduction Conference
inSITE is challenged through coordinated anti-harm reduction networks
A couple months back as supposed "independent" researcher published a report on inSITE at Institute on Global Drug Policy
It turns out this Institute is nothing more than a front group for anti-harm reduction forces, essentially coordinated by Drug Free America, and the Drug Czar out of the White House, who refer to harm reduction philosophy as "harm promotion".
An OP ED piece in the Vancouver Sun by Peter McKnight quite thoroughly debunked the so-called scientific, independence of the researcher attacking inSITE.
According to statistics compiled at inSITE:
Of the 500 overdoses that occurred at the site over a two-year period, none resulted in a fatality. If these overdoses happened on the street, many of these people may have died.A simple webpage has been created to try and follow the links, and connect the dots, regarding this attack on inSITE. The inSITE Debate webpage is found here
Other research results show:
* 7,278 unique individuals registered at Insite
* Women made up 26 per cent of clients
* Aboriginal people made up 18 per cent of clients
* Heroin was used in 41 per cent of injections
* Cocaine was used in 27 per cent of injections
* Morphine was used in 12 per cent of injections
* 453 overdoses resulted in no fatalities
* 4,084 referrals were made with 40 per cent of them made to addiction counselling
* Referral to withdrawal management: 368
* Referral to methadone maintenance: 2 per week
* Daily average visits: 607
* Average number of visits per month, per person: 11
* Busiest day: May 25, 2005 (933 visits in 18 hours)
* Number of nursing care interventions: 6,227
* Number of nursing interventions for abscess care: 2,055
After the War on Drugs - Options for Control
TRANSFORM Drug Policy Foundation's website offers a number of articles which explore issues to do with drug policy change; in particular, look into their Policy link.
After the War on Drugs - Options for Control is one of the most thorough examinations of the issues involved in decriminalization. The report was first released in 2004; and subsequently re-issued a couple of times, with some minor updates.
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'After the War on Drugs - Options for Control' is a major new report examining the key themes in the drug policy reform debate, detailing how legal regulation of drug markets will operate, and providing a roadmap and time line for reform. |
You can the most recent 2006 version by free download here
Pharmacotherapy and the Future of the Drug War
Produced by the Center for Cognative Liberty & Ethics, a report entitled Pharmacotherapy and the Future of the Drug War is a facsinating read about the use of drugs to counter drugs, and thus, a warning about the potential for anti-drug warriors to force drug users to take blocking-type drugs.
... the tremendously politicized nature of the drug war, raises substantial concerns that in addition to those who choose to use such medications, some people will be compelled to use them. In the absence of extraordinary circumstances, governmental action compelling a person to use a pharmacotherapy drug would violate a number of constitutional guarantees and other legal rights protecting people from forced medical treatment.This excellent 52 page .pdf document is available as a free download here
INPUD : International Network of People Who Use Drugs
Along side the development of harm reduction initiatives worldwide, and some might say, even spurring the development of such initiatives, activists who use drugs in many countries around the planet have been organizing their peers to stand up and voice for their rights in the face of attack by the forces of the international war on (some) drugs. Finally, after years of organizing in relative isolation, drug user activists worldwide have formed the International Network of People Who Use Drugs, or INPUD, to stand together in solidarity to address the oppression we face in common.
INPUD has formed out of the face-to-face meetings of drug user activists who, for more than a decade, have been attending the annual conferences of the International Harm Reduction Association. At last year's international conference in Vancouver, some 100 drug user activists from all over the world produced a declaration of purpose.
We are people from around the world who use drugs. We are people who have been marginalized and discriminated against; we have been killed, harmed unnecessarily, put in jail, depicted as evil, and stereotyped as dangerous and disposable . Now it is time to raise our voices as citizens, establish our rights and reclaim the right to be our own spokespersons striving for self-representation and self-empowerment...You can download the complete Vancouver Declaration here
To further their organizing efforts internationally, INPUD has recently launched a website.
At this year's 18th International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harms in Warsaw, Poland, May 12-17, 2007, INPUD will be meeting as an official satellite of the conference.
INPUD's Satellite Program is available for download
2006 U.N. Report: Afghanistan's Drug Industry
Comprehensive U.N. Report on the "Structure, Functioning,Dynamics, and Implications for Counter-Narcotics Policy"released in November 2006. It is a 223 page document in .pdf format.
Afghanistan's drug industry is a central issue for the country's state-building, security, governance, and development agenda. Recognizing the critical importance and multifaceted nature of the drug problem in Afghanistan, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and The World Bank embarked on a program of cooperative research and policy-oriented analysis. This work covered the major elements of Afghanistan's drug industry in addition to the rural household level: opium trading, prices and market interactions, the nexus between drug trafficking and the informal financial transfer system (hawala), the organized crime dimension, and the macroeconomic implications of the opium economy and counter-narcotics measures.The report provides detailed information on the tight connections between Afghanistan's post-Taliban governments at all levels (local, provincial, federal) and the unprecedented, record-level increases in production of opium in Afghanistan since U.S. led Coalition forces have been occupying the country. Clearly the Canadian Government is completely aware of the political reign of drug lords in the country, and clearly it is giving implicit approval by maintaining a high profile contingent of Canadian Forces in the ongoing counter-insurgency war.
Background analysis is found at globalresearch.ca
Vancouver's Safer Injection Site to continue to December 2007
On Friday, September 1, 2006, Federal Health Minister Tony Clement announced that the government had "deferred the decision" on Vancouver Coastal Health's application to extend the operating exemption for the SIS until December 31, 2007.
The Minister said that during that time, additional studies will be conducted into how supervised injection sites affect crime, prevention and treatment.
The SIS, Insite, will be allowed to continue operations during this review.
During the period until December 31, 2007, Health Canada will not entertain any applications for the establishment of additional injection sites in other parts of Canada until the NDS is in place, and the Vancouver review is completed.
Federal Government press release
Raising User Issues at International AIDS Conference in Toronto
We will be attending the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto, August 12-19. With some 30,000 people attending, it should be an incredible conference.
A coalition of harm reduction groups has just released a statement entitled IDU Leadership Statement as their basis of unity concerning issues and demands which must be addressed with regard to people who use injection drugs:
IDU Leadership Statement
XVI International AIDS Conference in Toronto, Canada
Today, the world's fastest growing HIV epidemics are among injecting drug users, a fact that is the result of inaction and missteps. After decades of experience and research on drug use and HIV and AIDS, the services we need to deliver are well-known. But such interventions can only be effective if supportive legislation, policies and attitudes are in place to prevent marginalization of drug users, eradicate stigma and discrimination, and ensure respect for human rights.
As leaders in the field of harm reduction and communities of people using drugs and living with HIV, we call on world leaders, policy makers, and communities represented at the International AIDS Conference 2006 to turn their political commitment into actual accountability, setting robust indicators and transparent reporting procedures to measure progress toward the speedy adoption and implementation of evidence-based policies. We urge:
* adequate coverage and low threshold access, including in correctional settings, to sterile injection equipment, condoms, methadone and buprenorphine as essential components of comprehensive HIV prevention and care;
* that drug users and all marginalized populations have equitable access to quality HIV prevention, medical care, and highly active antiretroviral treatment, that concrete country-level and global targets be established, and that progress be monitored;
* meaningful involvement of drug users at all levels of planning and policy, and financial support for their organizations;
* an end to disenfranchisement and human rights violations of drug users including mass imprisonment, punitive and degrading drug treatment programs, and the widespread use of withdrawal as a form of coercion.
Further, UNAIDS cannot fight the HIV epidemic when it faces counterproductive efforts from within the UN system. We demand that:
* the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as the UN agency tasked with leadership on HIV prevention among drug users, ensure that effective community protection against HIV is not ignored in the name of drug control and law enforcement;
* the International Narcotics Control Board, as the body charged with responsibility for monitoring implementation of the drug treaties, publicly and unambiguously endorse and promote harm reduction as an approach consistent with those treaties and monitor global delivery of substitution treatment and HIV prevention measures for drug users;
* the international community and all major UN bodies involved in drugs and HIV, approach drug use as a health and social matter which also requires some law enforcement interventions rather than being primarily a matter of criminal justice.
Signers:
International Harm Reduction Association, Asian Harm Reduction Network, Harm Reduction Coalition, Relard, Caribbean Harm Reduction Coalition, Harm Reduction Project, Canadian Harm Reduction Network, Global Network of People Living with HIV/AIDS, Open Society Institute
- for further information Harm Reduction Coalition
Canada's first safer injection site INSITE is threatened
There is a possibility that the Harper government will not renew the permit that enables INSITE to operate when its initial three year trial is completed on September 12th.
Please show your support for the continued operation of INSITE by sending an email to Prime Minister Harper. Please visit this link to an Automatic Email page
See article about Vancouver merchants supporting safer injection site.
Users Organizing Manual 2006
The NYC AIDS Housing Network has developed an excellent 30 page manual which thoroughly covers all aspects of organizing and operating an organization of people who use drugs (i.e. users group). Its Introduction asserts that:
This manual offers you the basics of engaging in community organizations, the basics of building an organization and a set of tools for you to use to build power among drug users in order to change unjust policies that cost lives and destroy communities.You can download this document here
You can also link to VOCAL-NY Users Union from the NYC AIDS Housing Network's website.
Ontario Harm Reduction Distribution Program Evaluation Study
The Ontario Harm Reduction Distribution Program is setting up a streamlined distribution process for harm reduction supplies to needle exchange programs throughout Ontario. The clearinghouse for the distribution program is the Street Health Center with the North Kingston Community Health Centre.
The Program Evaluation Study is being launched in the Summer of 2006. Needle exchange programs from throughout the province will be interviewing 70 injection drug users in their region on three seperate occasions over the coming year. Because over 30 needle exchange programs will be carrying out interviews, this study will provide the most complete picture yet of the risk behaviours and harm reduction awareness of injection drug users in Ontario.
UNDUN will be conducting the 3 phases of interviews on behalf of the needle exchange program of the Hastings and Prince Edward Counties Public Health Unit.
The OHRDP has a website
Drug User Advisory Group (DUAG) Wins Award
The Drug User Advisory Group was formed to assist the participation of people who use illicit drugs at the International Harm Reduction Association's 2006 world conference in Vancouver in May 2006.
The DUAG consisted of some 20 other user activists from across Canada. The DUAG organized a user-focussed website and a series of events during the the conference. They communicated weekly through teleconference calls. Deb and Brent of UNDUN were members of the DUAG.
IHRA recognized the valuable work done by this group of Canadian user activists by presenting them with their annual Rollsten award. Here is a short slideshow of DUAG members receiving an award for their work: Award Ceremony Video
Ontario Sets Up Methadone Task Force
On April 3, 2006 various Ontario media reported that Ontario Provincial Health Minister Bob Smitherman would be announcing the formation of an expert Task Force on Methadone.
The creation of this Task Force was hastened by a recent series of investigative news articles in the Toronto Star which highlight problems with Ontario's methadone distribution system, in particular a chain of for-profit methadone clinics, the Ontario Addiction Treatment Centres (OATC), and a pharmacy with supplies many OATC clinics with thousands of doses daily.
The formation of the Task Force was welcomed by a supportive Toronto Star editorial entitled Dispensing a solution.
UNDUN responded with a Letter to the Editor (Toronto Star, April 6, 2006) criticizing the absence of patient involvement in the Task Force. Letter is reprinted below:
Your editorial applauding Health Minister George Smitherman's establishment of a task force to look into methadone dispensing in Ontario ends, "They deserve a better system." Yes we, "the addicts", do deserve a better system. Yet once again the system creates a task force and we, "the addicts", are not included.
Like Smitherman, we are concerned about methadone treatment in Ontario. After all, it is our lives that are most directly affected by methadone policies, old and new. Yet once again, we are not consulted. Just like the doctors, pharmacists, nurses, and the coroner, we are experts too. But our expert opinions are not sought, even though we have much to contribute.
Methadone is unlike most medicines. It is not effective simply by taking it. Methadone maintenance is a social system of treatment, as much as it is a biochemical one. For the methadone treatment system to work effectively patients have to work the methadone treatment system and the system of methadone treatment has to work for the patients. Only we can provide feedback on the impact of system designs upon us.
It is not only demeaning, marginalizing, and prejudicial to not include us on the methadone task force, it isn't even common sense. Because it is our perception of the methadone treatment system in Ontario and our feelings regarding how that system impacts upon us which are critical in determining its practical effectiveness.
Thus, it simply makes good sense, as well as public-health sense and ethical and human rights sense, that we be included in contributing to the methadone treatment system's design in Ontario. It is high time we Ontarians recognize the benefits of greater and more meaningful involvement of people who use methadone in the development of better policy responses to the methadone maintenance system in this province. We Ontarians deserve a better methadone task force — one that includes "the addicts."
April 26 Official Announcement on formation of Ontario Methadone Task Force. Note that among its membership is one "community representative" and one "consumer representative". UNDUN is very interested and concerned to ensure that a process is developed whereby the issues of this province's thousands of methadone patients will be brought to the table of this Task Force's examinations.
Nothing About Us Without Us
"WE are part of the solution, not part of the problem!This is an exellent statement by a group of users of illegal drugs in Canada. It was developed as part of a project undertaken by the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network to look into the issue around "greater and more meaningful involvement" of drug users in harm reduction and drug policy development. You can access the full report document here
And we stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in other countries. They often suffer even greater abuses of their human rights.
We demand that our government take action not only in Canada, but also at the international level, so that drug use is treated as a health issue first and foremost, and we are involved in decisions that affect our lives."
You can also download a booklet version of Nothing About Us Without Us.
The booklet version contains a user-developed Manifesto written by people who use drugs, and describes the achievements of two organizations of people who use drugs, the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users and the Thai Drug Users’ Network.
Vancouver 2006 Users Gathering
April 30 - May 5 2006
From April 30 to May 5, 2006 The International Harm Reduction Association is holding its 17th annual world conference in Vancouver. This is the main harm reduction conference in the world. Harm reduction project workers, user activists, government officials, and medical professionals from around the world will be coming to Vancouver for this event.
Immediately following the main conference, there will be a Users Congress on May 5. The Congress is being organized by a User Advisory Team and will be run by user-peers. It is open to all international user activists who are coming to Vancouver, and to all Canadian drug users who are able to attend.
Get involved with Vancouver 2006 Users Congress though its website
This conference is a great opportunity for Canadian drug user activists gather and meet with other activists worldwide.
For more information, contact the User Advisory Team by email or through its phoneline at 613.336.2458
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Since May 16, 2007