On behalf The European Harm Reduction Network, Foundation Rainbow Group (FRG) in Amsterdam is conducting an overview study on drug consumption rooms (DCRs) in Europe.

The aim of this inventory is to get an overview of different concepts, working methods, organisational aspects and client experiences of European DCRs, to enable comparisons and professional inspiration on a transnational scale. To achieve this goal, FRG - in collaboration with Lancaster University and Akzept e.V. – is conducting evaluations and developing survey tools for further study.

Since 1986, more than 90 DCRs have been set up in Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Luxembourg, Norway and Denmark. Moreover, France is preparing their first DCR.

Outside Europe, Australia and Canada have one DCR each. Both facilities have published a significant amount of evaluations in English. In Europe some publications can be found on DCRs, but inventories on a European level are limited to basic overviews. This makes it necessary to gain a better understanding of DCR values, challenges and international differences and commonalities.

Currently two surveys are being conducted, namely: a client survey among DCR visitors in Amsterdam and Rotterdam (The Netherlands) and a facility survey for DCR managers.

116 client interviews have been completed and will be analysed and reported before May 2014, when they will be presented at the European Harm Reduction Conference in Basel. This survey focused on two major aspects: individual Quality of Life (QoL) and DCR experience. Regarding the latter, clients were for instance asked about their general satisfaction and to what extent the DCR has contributed to changed drug use behaviour, knowledge on drug use related matters (e.g. overdose) and access to services.

Concerning the inventory among DCR managers basic data has been collected on the different facilities in and outside Europe in order to write up a renewed general overview. Additionally, in October 2013, an online survey will be distributed among all facility managers outside the Netherlands (N= 51). In the Netherlands, the Trimbos Institute in 2002 and 2010, already collected data on Dutch facilities (N=30) in 2002 and 2010. With the cooperation of DCR managers it shall result in ample opportunity to compare DCR services, goals, approaches and good practices.

Besides, it could give basic insight into the essentials for developing DCRs.

Developed for this study and for future evaluations three survey tools have resulted, which will be made available for other interested organisations in 2014:

* The client survey on quality of life (QoL) and DCR experience.

* The online DCR manager survey on facilities and organizational aspects of the DCR. This will be made available through Lime survey.

* A staff survey, which may be used as a basic evaluation tool on the DCR staff views.

(swoods@correlation-net.org<mailto:swoods@correlation-net.org>) if you have any questions on this overview study or wish to receive one of the survey tools once it is ready to go public.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.

EuroHRN conducts a study on drug consumption rooms. Get involved? 

The Hungarian Civil Liberties Union created a series of videos at the International Drug Policy Reform Conference in Denver, Colorado, where more than 1000 drug policy reformers have come together to discuss how to end the global war on drugs. Below are a few v ideos of the speeches from the opening session.

Ifetayo Harvey, an activists whose father was incarcerated and later deported because of the drug war:

Reverend Sanders, the board member of the Drug Policy Alliance :

Ethan Naderlmann, the head of the Drug Policy Alliance :

Congressman Jared Polis' speech, who introduced legislation that would end federal marijuana prohibition:

Films from the International Drug Policy Reform Conference

The Global Drug Survey (GDS) is the world’s biggest annual survey of drug use. And this year, we’re bigger than ever before.

This year, GDS is about to become truly global. Our findings will be translated into Spanish, Portuguese, French, Flemish, German, Hungarian and Danish with media partners in the USA (Huffington Post); UK (Guardian, Mixmag, Hot Press & Gay Times); Australia and New Zealand (Fairfax Media) and Europe including Liberation in France, Der Morgen in Belgium and still others in the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Denmark as well as Brazil and Mexico. We are asking for your help.

This year other than drug prevalence, cost and patterns of use including new drug trends, GDS has a big focus on marijuana. We will ask what effects the weed you smoke at the moment has. Does it make you sleepy, or tired? Hyper and excited? Relaxed or paranoid? Then we ask users to describe their perfect smoke, so we can share that information with weed growers – so they might diversify away from strong skunk weed, which we know from our other research is not want most people prefer.

Most people who drink and / or use drugs don’t become dependent or experience significant problems with them. In the vast majority of cases neither are they used to manage underlying emotional or physical problems: people take them to enhance or even create an experience. And of course they are, in many cases, intensely pleasurable. Users know that, and to speak solely of harm, means many switch off. But drugs 

 also harmful, andthe best way to discuss ways to reduce those harms is to acknowledge many people’s main motivation for using them: pleasure and fun.

This year alongside our ground-breaking research into users’ marijuana preferences, we will be undertaking the biggest ever survey of harm reduction strategies among drug users, finding out what people do and what they might be willing to do in the real work to maximise the fun they have while minimising the risks of harm. We’ll be asking about nitrous oxide (laughing gas) and prescription drug use, spotting new psychoactive drugs, exploring what happens around the world when you get caught with drugs and the whole murky and increasingly controversial area of workplace drug-testing.

You can respond to the survey anonymously atwww.globaldrugsurvey.com/GDS2014. The results will be published in March 2014

Global Drug Survey - The world’s biggest annual survey on drug use

The World Health Organization, HIV Department, is currently in the process of consolidating guidance on HIV and key populations and developing technical briefs on adolescent key populations.

Although a significant effort has been made by many countries to reach people in key populations, the response remains inadequate with coverage low and access to services often inadequate and unacceptable.

To illustrate how a broad range of HIV programmes and services cater to the needs of adult and young key population groups, we are calling for examples of good practice to be included as case studies within the guidance. These examples of good practice will assist in improving the quality, coverage and equity of services and interventions for key populations.

Through this survey you can offer programme examples of good practice for key populations affected by HIV through completing a short scoping survey.

The closing date for programme examples is 30 November 2013.

WHO short e-survey: Good practice for key populations programmes

TORONTO -- A consortium of AIDS prevention and harm reduction groups are launching a renewed call for needle and syringe programs in Canadian prisons. They argue such programs -- which give inmates who use drugs access to clean needles -- would not only protect prisoners from infection but would also safeguard against the spread of diseases once inmates are released. Canadian prisons do not currently permit the distribution of sterile injection equipment and the federal government has repeatedly said it has no plans to implement such programs, despite their success in some countries.

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/aids-prevention-groups-want-prison-needle-programs-to-protect-inmates-public-1.1502466#ixzz2iQjtQSzJ

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert

Canadian AIDS prevention groups want prison needle programs to protect inmates

With Colorado and Washington State launching the regulated marijuana markets approved by the voters in 2012, the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) and the Drug Policy Alliance are hosting an international delegation in Denver ib 23rd October to learn first hand from Colorado’s experience in enacting and implementing Amendment 64.

Comprised of government officials and legislators from Uruguay, México, and Canada, the delegation will be briefed by Colorado and Washington officials on the regulations being put in place in the states. On Tuesday and Wednesday, the delegation will visit cultivation facilities and dispensaries.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.

International delegation visits Colorado to learn about regulating marijuana

The Home Secretary, Theresa May, is being sued in a case funded by the Kenyan government after she criminalised a herbal stimulant using by thousands of Africans living in Britain. Earlier this year the Home Office announced a ban on the import, sale and possession of khat (Catha edulis) – a leaf widely chewed or made into tea across Africa and the Middle East. Its effects are said to be similar to, but less intense, than those of cocaine with side effects that can include insomnia and depression.

While the decision to ban khat has been relatively uncontroversial in Britain it has sparked protests in Kenya – where it is an important source of export income and provides a livelihood for thousands of farmers.

Now documents lodged at the High Court on behalf of a khat trader in London, and financed by the Kenyan government, claim the ban breaches the human rights of khat users.

Kenya funds lawsuit against UK ban on herbal stimulant khat

Despite sharp divisions among members of parliament (MP) on the controversial issue, at the end of yesterday's debate, the motion was passed without a voice of dissent.

Contributing to the debate, Central St James MP Lloyd B. Smith came down on the side of decriminalising the weed but cautioned about the implemen-tation of any such proposed legislation.

Smith suggested that an extensive public-education exercise accompany the implementation of proposed ganja law.

Lawmakers give nod to decriminalisation of cannabis in Jamaica

This conference will focus on drug markets, the harms caused by both the supply of and demand for drugs, and the intended and unintended consequences of policy.

The eighth annual conference of the International Society for the Study of Drug Policy (ISSDP) will be held in Rome, Italy, from Wednesday 21st to Friday 23rd of May 2014 at the venue CNR (National Research Council).

The event is being organized by the Centre for Biostatistics and Bioinformatics of the University of Tor Vergata and the Italian Social Science Council.

The deadline for application is 20th January 2014.

Call for papers: Eighth annual conference of the International Society for the Study of Drug Policy

Laos - located between thriving opium and methamphetamine producers in Myanmar and a reported consumer base of more than two million drug users in China - has sought to limit the impact of drug transit, use and production on its population. But the government’s policies, which harshly penalize drug use, are hampering efforts to treat addiction, say health researchers.

“People who use drugs are treated first and primarily as criminals, with their health needs often not properly addressed with evidence-based interventions,” said Robert Gray, a technical expert on harm reduction for Population Services International (PSI), a nonprofit global health organization headquartered in Washington, DC.

Other countries in the region have begun moving away from compulsory detention for drug users, following advocacy from rights groups and reports of abuses committed in drug detention centres.

But Lao's eight treatment-and-detention centres still operate based on a 2008 drug law that authorizes involuntary detention for drug users, who are effectively treated as criminals. As required by law, all the country’s drug treatment centres are government-run.

According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Laos’s detention centres for drug users have improved since 2011, when human rights abuses such as beatings and rape were documented by Human Rights Watch (HRW) and by the Open Society Foundations (OSF).

Compulsory detention for drug use undermines treatment in Laos

Two years on from its initial founding in Marseilles, the European Network of People who Use Drugs was relaunched last week during a side meeting held at the Correlation/Swedish Drug Users Union/INPUD organised peer workshop on drug use and HCV.

32 activists from 13 countries (UK, Sweden, Norway, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Eire, Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal, Northern Ireland, and Italy) gathered to commit themselves to reaffirming the need for a European network. Representatives from most of the major European drug user unions were represented including France's ASUD, the Swedish Drug Users Union, Germany's JES, Norway's FHN, CASO from Portugal, Uisce from Eire, the Greek Drug Users' Union, the National Users' Network from the UK amongst others.

Relaunch of the European Network of People who Use Drugs

Authorized medical patients in Romania may now use marijuana to allay their pain under new provisions in two of the country's narcotic laws. Romania legalized medical marijuana this week, becoming the 10th member of the European Union to do so, according to local reports.

Currently, possession of marijuana is outlawed throughout the country. Though recreational marijuana use is still be prohibited, derivatives of the plant can now be used to treat certain medical conditions, such as epilepsy, cancer and sclerosis.

Manufacturers will also be able to apply to the National Agency for Medicines for approval to market drugs that contain marijuana by-products like resins or plant fragments.

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