October 2 will live long in US harm reduction history. A federal judge ruled that Safehouse⁠—a nonprofit planning to open the first sanctioned safe consumption site on US soil in Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood⁠—would

“The ultimate goal of Safehouse’s proposed operation is to reduce drug use, not facilitate it,” wrote US District Judge Gerald Austin McHugh Jr. in his detailed 56-page opinion, “and accordingly 856(a) does not prohibit Safehouse’s proposed conduct.”

Bill McSwain, the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, filed a motion in February seeking to prevent 

 from opening on the grounds that providing a safe space for drug users to inject is illegal under law 856(a)—the so-called “crack house statute” of the Controlled Substances Act.

US Attorney McSwain and his allies then argued in court against both the legality and the efficacy of safe consumption sites—which operate in 10 countries around the world and are shown by reams of evidence to reduce harms and save lives. A June survey showed 90 percent local support for an SCS in Kensington.

Huge court win for Philadelphia safe consumption site⁠ — but fight isn’t over

«ROAD 184» is an opportunity to spend several days with LUNEST, travel hundreds of kilometers and visit several cities - Tallinn, Johvi, Kohtla-Järve, Narva, where the organization works. This film is a story about incredible people, where each person is a road full of pain, love and hope.

The clip discusses what LUNEST is and what they do, along with presenting the perspectives of different people associated with the organisation who have previous history of drug use, prison and/or diseases.

Road 184

On 13 July 2019, Think Centre reported that 32 executions have occurred in Singapore since it ended its moratorium on the death penalty in 2014. At the same time, lawyers defending capital cases have reported receiving threats from the government. As of the date of writing, Singapore is among 24 world states that have not ratified the ICCPR and its protocols.

Drug trafficking offences topped the list


The overwhelming majority (84%) of the executions in Singapore is drug-related offences, presenting a significant increase of execution numbers for drug offenders since 2017. Singapore is among 35 countries that retain the death penalty for drug offences, Harm Reduction International highlighted.

The recently amended Misuse of Drugs Act stipulated that the accused could avoid mandatory death penalty on two conditions; if their role is merely a courier and if they provide substantive assistance to receive Certificate of Cooperation issued solely by the Attorney-General’s Chambers. As highlighted by Think Centre, two problematic factors might significantly reduce the likelihood of getting the certificate. First, when the status of merely a courier prevents the accused to provide enough information to receive the certificate, as illustrated in the case of Bill Agbozo, a Ghanaian man executed to death in 2018. Second, when the accused have borderline intelligence levels and played only the role of a mere courier, such as the case of Nagaenthran.

“The death penalty is a cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment that has no place in any society that wants to pride itself as being modern, developed and civilized,” Think Centre reiterates. Furthermore, it has never been conclusively shown that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than long term imprisonment.

Singapore executes people sentenced to death for non-violent crimes and threatens their lawyers

This year’s Results Report shows clearly why we must step up the fight against the epidemics of HIV, TB and malaria. While the Global Fund partnership continues to have huge impact, saving 32 million lives since 2002, the world is not on track to meet the Sustainable Development Goal 3 (SDG 3) target of ending the epidemics by 2030. We need a sharp change of trajectory.

In the fight against HIV, we continue to make progress through expanding testing and treatment towards UNAIDS’s 90-90-90 targets. To maximize impact, we must improve retention and viral suppression rates and the treatment of coinfections through greater focus on the quality of treatment services, including more differentiated approaches to reflect the distinct needs of different communities, greater integration of services and swifter adoption of new regimens.

Yet, while effective diagnosis and treatment are fundamental to the strategy to defeat HIV, it is increasingly clear that we must get better at prevention and in particular, in addressing the underlying drivers of new infections. We will only beat HIV if we dismantle the human rights barriers faced by key populations that simultaneously increase their vulnerability to infection and impair their access to health services. Likewise, we will only beat HIV if we tackle the stark structural gender inequalities that make adolescent girls and young women in sub-Saharan Africa twice as likely to be infected with HIV than their male peers.

The United Nations High-Level Meeting on Tuberculosis in September 2018 represented a significant milestone in the fight against the infectious disease that is now responsible for more deaths than any other: for the first time, political leaders across the world acknowledged the scale of the epidemic, recognized the pace of progress is unacceptable and committed to a bold new goal of finding, and treating, 40 million people from 2018-2022.

Global Fund results report 2019

It is deeply worrying that the fundamental rights of people who use drugs are constantly compromised by hostile supply reduction activities and the criminalisation of minor non-violent drug offences.

All too often, governments are quick to blame drugs and drug users for so many lives lost, while forgetting the impact of drug control mechanisms that are causing more harm than the drugs themselves. The negative impacts of the criminalisation of people who use drugs continue to raise serious concerns in most African countries. Every individual has a right to access life-saving health services without fear of punishment or discrimination.

However, fear of criminal sanctions generally drives people who use drugs away from proven, effective harm reduction services, leading to infections and premature death from HIV, hepatitis C and overdose. This notion has most recently been recognised by all UN agencies in their new Common Position on Drugs.

The failed war on drugs: What Africa needs to do

This week UN member states convened at the UN high-level meeting on universal health coverage to agree a political declaration and discuss ways forward towards reaching UHC for all.

Frontline AIDS, in partnership with the Global Network of People Living with HIV, International Civil Society Support and our Partnership to Inspire, Transform and Connect the HIV Response (PITCH) partners, have been pushing for the inclusion of the most marginalised within this declaration, and for strong commitments for people living with, and most affected by HIV.

We welcomed the declaration’s three references to HIV/AIDS, and recognition of the need to support people living with HIV/AIDS in particular, as well as mentions of the additional barriers faced by marginalised and vulnerable groups.

We had pushed for explicit references to key populations (gay men and men who have sex with men, transgender people, sex workers, people who use drugs and adolescent girls and young women), without success. However we’re happy that there is explicit mention of the impacts that stigma and discrimination have on people who are (as the declaration puts it) “vulnerable or in vulnerable situations”.

Strong support for sexual and reproductive health and rights (despite opposition)

Throughout the negotiations on the political declaration there had been resistance from conservative governments against the inclusion of progressive language on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). Led by the US, a group of 19 governments, issued a statement against the inclusion of sexual and reproductive rights. In response, a much larger group of over 50 supportive governments, issued a strong counter statement in support of comprehensive SRHR and continued to push for the rights of adolescent girls, women and the most marginalised.

Discussions during the high-level meeting revealed continued support for SRHR and particularly for sexual and reproductive rights, which is missing from the political declaration. For example, the UK government made a pledge to spend £600 million on a new program for reproductive health supplies.

Does the UN’s Universal Health Coverage declaration fail the most vulnerable people?

In October this year I will leave Transform, after 25 years of campaigning for drug policy reform. I founded the organisation when I was 32, in 1994, to campaign for an end to global drug prohibition, and to replace it with an effective, just and humane system of regulation and control. It’s been an extraordinary trip. In 1994 I was still ten years away from having kids of my own and South Africa had its first elections in which black people could vote. Many years ago I said that I’d put a quarter of a century of my career into this and my time is now up. I’m not sure where I’m going next, but I’m proud that Transform’s work has helped turn legal regulation from fantasy into reality.

Transform stands on the shoulders of giants and I cannot praise highly enough colleagues past and present with whom I’ve worked. Legalisation and regulation of drugs is now unstoppable – I’m just sorry that we haven’t managed to curtail more of the terrible impacts of drug prohibition. But I’m delighted to say that Transform is in great shape both in terms of personnel and financially, and we are parting on very good terms. The staff team here is particularly strong and we have just filled two new posts.

I want especially to thank all Transform’s donors over the years and to all those who provided support to us in one way or another.

I knew that ours wasn’t going to be a quick win – this is a global war that has the full backing of the permanent members of the UN Security Council, and 180 UN member states. Even so, back in 2004 I suggested that the global drug war would be over by 2020. It isn’t, but we are winning the peace, as more countries leave the prohibition party and adopt both decrim and legal regulation. However, we are also losing the peace in places like North America, Mexico, Colombia and the Philippines, where the drug war leaves tens of thousands dead every year.

Danny Kushlick is leaving Transform

When Rodrigo Velez received a call in 2008 asking him to become Ecuador’s new “Drug Czar,” he thought it was a joke. Velez managed a family-owned agro-business. He had no experience working in the public sector and knew little about illicit drugs.

As a courtesy, he agreed to attend one meeting. Government officials laid out a shocking proposition. The new President, Rafael Correa, of PAIS Alliance, a center-left party, wanted to decriminalize drug use. Would Velez lead national reform efforts?

At first, Velez declined. But officials insisted that the government needed his connections to private industry and skills bringing together diverse actors to solve problems. They explained the issues with overcrowded prisons and lack of drug treatment programs. Velez finally accepted.

When I met Rodrigo Velez in Guayaquil, Ecuador, the mystery surrounding his appointment became clear. What Velez lacks in experience, he makes up for in passion. The charismatic 60-year-old with salt-and-pepper hair loves to problem-solve, to connect people, and to pound new ideas into old institutions—sometimes literally. Throughout our interview, he slammed his fist onto the table for emphasis.

Ecuador’s new task force launched in 2008. Velez used his connections and charisma to gather industry leaders, academics, researchers and international law experts. One glaring omission from this group, however, was people directly impacted by drug policy and criminalization. Strict class divisions in Ecuador ensure that few policymakers invite marginalized populations to the table.

Ecuador’s drug decriminalisation bid has lessons for the world

Last August, 35-year-old Sophea sat on the edge of a wooden bed frame that occupied most of the single-room home she and her husband, Piseth, shared with their five children, who ranged in age from an infant son to an adult daughter.

The smell of burning plastic from a nearby dump wafted into the tiny, tin-roofed house in a slum on the outskirts of the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh. Since Piseth lost a leg after stepping on a landmine while serving in the Cambodian army, the money from his street begging and Sophea’s ragpicking – about 10,000 riels (US$2.40) a day – had not been enough to make ends meet. Sophea was pregnant with her sixth child.

A railway line separates the slum from a high-security gated complex. The pair often crossed the tracks to scavenge among the refuse of their wealthy neighbours. So when a woman who had arrived in the slum several months earlier, and who always seemed to be a little bit better off than everyone else, showed up with a proposal, a desperate Sophea was willing to listen.

“The woman said she came together with a few others and did pickpocketing in markets,” Sophea says, looking down at the concrete floor of her house while nursing her youngest child. “I joined her to steal people’s wallets, but soon the police caught us and I was in jail, charged with petty theft.”

In Cambodia’s prisons, pregnant women and young children are inmates

Finland, the happiest country in the world, and the new EU president, had national elections. Did cannabis have a place in the political debate?

Medical cannabis has been available in its modern form in Finland since 2006 through a judicial decision made during a patient case which went all the way to the Supreme Administrative Court (Mikkonen 2016). Finland was the first Nordic/Baltic country to legally allow some forms of cannabinoid therapeutics, but instead of seizing the opportunity, the country has fallen short in harvesting the full medicinal potential of the plant.

By way of a bit of a background to this Nordic country and its relation to cannabis, Cannabis indicae herb (Intianhamppu or Indian hemp), was still listed in the Finnish Pharmacopeia in 1937 (Pharmacopoea Fennica 1937: 304-305) but removed from subsequent editions until Sativex® was approved around 2012. Bedrocan® products from the Dutch medical cannabis company are also available but only through a special permit.

The number of prescriptions for medical cannabis products are still low, despite rising from 57 in 2011 to 223 in 2014 (Eklund 2015) and 373 in 2017 (Malin 2019). The prescription rates fell in 2018 to 269 prescriptions, partly due to governmental authorities adopting a strict approach to the regulation of cannabis as medicine.

Cannabis is a difficult fit in the current medical model and the voice of patients is often forgotten in the debate. A recent article by Suomen Kuvalehti revealed that Finnish medical authorities and the Social Insurance Institution of Finland (Kela) have pressured doctors to discontinue prescriptions on the grounds that there is not sufficient evidence or clinical guidelines for using cannabis as medicine.

In addition to prescription holders, in 2017 there were an estimated 2000-5000 cannabis users in Finland who used cannabis for medical reasons without a prescription (Hakkarainen & Karjalainen 2017, p. 23). Cannabis also remains the most used “illegal drug”; according to a recent national survey 24 per cent have at least tried cannabis in their lifetime. 42 per cent of Finns think the use of cannabis should not have criminal penalties and 72 per cent think cannabis should be allowed at least for medical use.

Grass roots: Cannabis decriminalization campaign in Finland pushing towards public agenda

Damian Sobczyk is a Polish videoblogger and a drug user activist whose mission is to help young people to reduce the risks of drug use. His channel had 137,000 subscribers when YouTube decided to ban it without any concrete explanation. Read Drugreporter’s interview, conducted by Adam Stasiak!

How did you get involved in harm reduction?

 I became interested in the topic of psychoactive substances in college. I wrote my master’s thesis on the drug problem in the European Union. Writing it, I discovered how little material on this subject was available and how many things had to be done in the field of drug policy. We have examples of countries that are good at it and we should follow their examples. I decided to deal with this topic more extensively. I was thinking about publishing a book, but I figured that I would reach more people thanks to new media, in particular through a YouTube channel. For a few years I couldn’t make up my mind if I should do it or not. I was afraid of how this would affect my professional life. My fears turned out to be true because 9 months after the foundation of the channel, when it began to gain popularity, my superiors gave me an ultimatum – either I close the channel, or I have to leave work. They were afraid of losing contracts since their employee was dealing with a controversial topic. I chose to work on the channel then because I believed that its mission is right and socially desirable. Your channel is called “I know my dope” – an interesting choice of name, maybe even controversial for some people in Poland. Could you tell us what your channel is about and who it is directed at?

The channel’s goal is to reduce negative consequences that may result from the use of psychoactive substances, addiction prevention, and supporting a rational drug policy based on world-proven solutions. Young people are the dominant audience among my viewers. 90% of people watching me are 18-35 years old. I think that content can be interesting for everyone because even if someone is not a user, it is very likely that they know such people in their surroundings.

YouTube removed my channel for promoting harm reduction – An interview with Damian Sobczyk

If you’ve had cause to wonder whether opioids are helpful or harmful in your life right now, you’re definitely not alone.

People take opioids for many reasons. A lot of people take opioids like codeine and oxycodone for chronic pain, illness and injury because of the therapeutic benefits of opioids.

As much as they can make us feel better, in other circumstances, they can make you feel worse. Sometimes much worse.

Getting on top of opioid dependence or addiction is difficult for a lot of us.

The stigma we encounter definitely doesn’t help. If you feel like it’s time to learn more about dependence on or addiction to opioids, read on.

This website provides information about opioid dependence (which may be diagnosed as Opioid Use Disorder or OUD) and about different options for treatment.

Opioids include pain medications that are often prescribed by doctors, such as codeine, morphine, oxycodone and fentanyl, and drugs that are usually illegal, such as heroin and opium. They are usually used to treat pain, but they can also be used to treat opioid dependence.

Some people use opioids for the pleasant, relaxed feeling that they give, even if they don’t have any pain. Some people may start using opioids to treat a medical problem, but continue to use them even after their problem has gone.

Anyone can develop a dependence to opioids. It doesn’t matter why or how they use opioids, how old they are, what their background is, or their life experience – 

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