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All of us in the community of substance use
research mourn the sudden and untimely
passing of Bruce Johnson
, our exceptional
colleague and one of America’s leading authorities
on illicit drug markets and the criminal and social
consequences of drug use and sales.
Bruce earned his Ph.D. in sociology from
Columbia University and was affiliated with the
National Institute of Justice's arrestee drug abuse
monitoring programme from its inception in 1987 to
its close in 2003, and his five books and more than
150 articles are based on findings emerging from
more than 20 federally
funded research projects.
Since 1992 Bruce had
directed the Institute for
Special
Populations
Research (ISPR) at NDRI
(National Development
and Research Institutes),
the nation's largest
nonprofit research org-
anisation focused on
substance use. Using
both qualitative and
quantitative
methods,
ISPR investigates the
epidemiology and con-
sequences of substance
use among diverse, at-risk
populations
including
marginalised groups such as the poor, the
homeless, distressed households, arrestees, and
persons from particular ethnic communities.
Recent ISPR studies include analysis of
changes among illegal drug users and drug
markets in New Orleans and Houston following
Hurricane Katrina, transient domesticity in
partnering patterns among drug-using African-
Americans in New York City, prescription opioid
use, misuse, and diversion among street drug
users and development of web-based training for
practitioners regarding traumatic brain injury,
hepatitis C, HIV confidentiality, methamphetamine
use and methadone treatment.
Bruce was also the director of Behavioral
Sciences Training in Drug Abuse Research, the
largest substance abuse-focused pre- and post-
doctoral training program in the US, where fellows
are recruited from a spectrum of countries and
cultures and from fields including sociology,
psychology, anthropology, criminology, criminal
justice, history, nursing and public health. In all,
Bruce nurtured the careers of more than 160
research professionals in the first 24 years of the
programme. He was particularly concerned with
advancing the careers of women and members of
racial and ethnic minority groups, and at the time of
his death he was serving as an expert staff member
of a coordinating centre for minority fellowship pro-
grams funded by the federal Substance Abuse and
Mental Health Services Administration.
A champion of collabor-
ation, Bruce maintained
decades-long
working
relationships with several
fellow researchers who
profited from his intellectual
and personal generosity.
Many who worked with him
recall unsolicited acts of
kindness along with the
research advice we actively
sought from him. He loved
to scuba-dive and he’d
contact his staff from pretty
much anywhere he was
travelling to offer comments
on a grant proposal,
conference paper or journal
article – and sometimes to
remind them to water his plants. Bruce also loved
the symphony, and the sounds of Mahler and
Mozart wafting from his office were reliable signs
that proposals and publications were under
construction.
Bruce’s concern for the marginalised and the
troubled was not merely academic. Many years ago,
with other members of the church he belonged to in
New York City, he helped found a community non-
profit that provides healthy meals, shelter, therapy,
training and counseling to needy individuals, helping
people to turn their lives around.
It isn’t necessary to count the number of lives
Bruce touched in order to feel the magnitude of our
loss. But we also know that his contributions to
social science, and especially research on
substance use, are equally great and lasting.
Bruce D. Johnson, Ph.D.
February 22, 1943 – February 21, 2009
6 –
Daily Update
– DAY THREE – Wednesday 22 April 2009
A people’s champion
This morning’s major session,
Risk environments and drug harms
, is dedicated
to Bruce Johnson.
Don Des Jarlais
remembers a research pioneer
‘It isn’t necessary to count
the number of lives Bruce
touched in order to feel
the magnitude of our loss.’
Putting out
the fire
Elden Chamberlain
of the Inter-
national HIV/Aids Alliance, in
collaboration with Health and
Development Networks, reports on
a regional success story
With most governments in Asia
unwilling to embrace a comprehensive
harm reduction approach, we have
seen an explosion of HIV among drug
users. However one country has gone
against this trend.
Taiwan does not spring to mind
when considering best practice for
harm reduction – nonetheless Asia’s
best example of a comprehensive
harm reduction programme exists in
this small country. ‘When the house is
on fire you need to do something
about it,’ said Dr Hou Sheng-mou,
former health minister of Taiwan, at a
meeting on Monday evening. He was
describing the dramatic rise of IDU-
related HIV between 2004 and 2006.
‘After looking around the world for
ways to tackle this problem, a harm
reduction approach seemed like the
best solution.’
Dr Hou and his team devised a
monitoring, screening, syringe and
methadone programme, supported by
education and treatment referral. In
2005 the government approved a trial
programme in four counties, leading to
a significant reduction in new HIV
cases. It immediately grasped the
importance of the results – unlike many
‘pilot’ projects elsewhere in the region –
and implemented a nationwide
programme the following year.
The results speak for themselves.
IDU-related HIV infections dropped
from 70 per cent of all cases in 2005 to
28 per cent in 2008, while drug related
crime dropped 27 per cent. ‘The
greatest challenge in promoting a harm
reduction programme is to change
people’s mindset – from thinking of
IDUs as criminals to thinking of them as
patients,’ said Dr Hou.
The Taiwanese Centre for Disease
Control estimates it has prevented
more than 50,000 cases of HIV. The
evidence is there. Taiwan’s neigh-
bours need to take notice.