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Monday 10 June 2013 –
Daily Update
– 3
‘Eurasia is one of the regions that’s
been most severely hit by the HIV
epidemic related to injecting drug use,’
says HRI executive director Rick Lines of
the decision to stage this year’s conference
in Lithuania – the first time the event has
been held in the Baltic States, and its first
time in Eastern Europe since 2007.
‘It’s also a region where the harm reduc-
tion response is underdeveloped,’ he says.
‘There are high levels of need and a lot of
countries with generally poor harm reduc-
tion services, severely repressive drug laws
and human rights violations against people
who use drugs. Having the conference in
the Eurasian region was an important way
to call attention to these issues.’
Lithuania is also home to HRI’s partner
organisation, the Eurasian Harm Reduction
Network. ‘They approached us with a
proposal to hold the conference here and
they’re a fantastic organisation so we
jumped at the chance,’ he says.
This year’s theme is the
Value/s of harm
reduction
, with a focus on two key issues.
The first is the economic case – the fact that
harm reduction ‘not only saves lives but is
also a very cost-effective public health
intervention’, he states.
‘But we also wanted to focus on the
values
, because one of the things we’re
seeing is the pushback against harm
reduction by conservative governments
pushing a recovery agenda. Even five years
ago the anti-harm reduction lobby was
trying to argue against the scientific basis of
harm reduction, but you rarely hear that
now. Instead they try to frame harm
reduction as this kind of morally suspect,
very clinical response that doesn’t value
people and sees them as simply receptors
of services. So it’s also about reclaiming the
moral, ethical and philosophical basis of
harm reduction.’
Wednesday sees a debate on whether
policy reform advocacy and harm reduction
advocacy are in sync in the run-up to the
2016 UN General Assembly special session
on drugs. ‘That’s a really important part of
the programme,’ he says. ‘At this moment,
political momentum in drug policy reform is
based around two issues – cannabis reform
in the US and other places, and concerns
around state security in Latin America. So
the question for harm reductionists is how
do we fit into this – how do we use the
opening that’s being created in the drug
policy debate to advance harm reduction?’
Many harm reduction organisations
have pragmatically avoided involvement in
drug policy reform debates, he stresses,
so that their services aren’t seen as ‘Trojan
horses’ by governments. ‘It’s recognising
that we have to be part of that discussion,
but in a way that doesn’t threaten
essential programmes.’
Other highlights include sessions on
important new work around injecting drug
use and people under 18, and a number of
high-profile speakers. ‘The degree of
interest from high-level speakers has really
been beyond anything we’ve had before,
and again a lot of that is overlapping with
the growing movement around drug policy
reform,’ he says. ‘It’s an important part of
trying to destigmatise harm reduction, and
hopefully the presence of dignitaries like
Michel Kazatchkine and President Ruth
Dreifuss will also have an impact in the
region.
‘The other important thing is just how
great it’s been working with the Eurasian
Harm Reduction Network,’ he states.
‘They’ve been a great partner and it was
really a good opportunity to build the
relationships between our organisations –
we’ve already started to develop a lot of
other partnerships and advocacy efforts. It’s
been a really good experience for us.’
‘We need to reclaim the moral,
ethical and philosophical basis
of harm reduction’
‘How do we use
the opening that’s
being created in
the drug policy
debate to advance
harm reduction?’
RICK LINES
HRI executive director
Rick Lines
tells the
Daily Update about some of the key themes and
programme highlights of this year’s conference