On this International Women’s Day, let’s pause for reflection on the changes of the past 12 months. The COVID19 pandemic has impacted heavily on women worldwide, accentuating pre- existing inequalities. In general, mainstream awareness of these deepening and unacceptable disparities remains very low. One of the barriers to awareness and change has been a tendency towards “otherism” in portrayal and perceptions of women who use drugs.

Intersectionality refers to the ways in which different aspects of a person’s identity can expose them to overlapping forms of discrimination and marginalisation. With its roots in the black feminist movement, awareness of intersectionality is very useful for understanding and addressing inequities experienced by women who use drugs. WHRIN work in this space can help to identify where this is affecting women who use drugs, bringing into focus the interrelation of systems of oppression. We can better identify specific needs and help ensure compassionate and effective policies and health options.

Intersectionality and women who use drugs. WHRIN statement on International Women’s Day 2021

A new global Aids strategy is being developed at the United Nations. This really should be breaking news and the subject of major attention around the world. Unfortunately, it is not.

“Epidemics are like large signposts,” the German doctor and founder of social medicine Rudolf Virchow wrote in 1848, “[and] form an inseparable part of the cultural history of mankind.” However, the international community appears to have lost an understanding of the enduring significance of the global response to the HIV/Aids epidemic. The signposts for this are nevertheless all around if we care to look. One topical example is the question: How come Covid-19 vaccines were developed relatively quickly?

As Professor Glenda Gray, the president of the South African Medical Research Council, explained to 

 on 30 November 2020, it has everything to do with the response to HIV:

“Covid-19, Ebola and Zika [virus] have benefited enormously from all the work that has gone into developing platforms for HIV vaccines, so if we had not invested all this money into HIV, we would not have solutions for Ebola, Zika and SARS-CoV-2. It’s because of those platforms that we’ve been able to nimbly move to the next pathogen.”

In a world where recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic is top of the political agenda and vital for everyone’s future, we would do well to relearn some vital lessons about the nature and transformative potential that the HIV/Aids response has exemplified. This is not only because the Aids crisis will remain serious for the foreseeable future – it is also because the global response to HIV/Aids is one of the only successes the international community has had in the past two decades (even if some may describe this success as relative, given the scale of challenges still before us). We need to learn from and build on success. It is rare these days that we have such an opportunity.

What the global response to HIV/Aids can teach us about Covid-19 recovery – and social justice

By Simona Marinescu / United Nations Samoa

Earlier this month, and in December 2020 the government conducted operations that resulted in the confiscation of a total of 1,400 grams of methamphetamine at the border, smuggled from the US. The law enforcement officials (from the Ministry of Customs and Revenue and the Ministry of Police and Prisons) that intercepted these drugs deserve congratulations for their professionalism and skill. Meth is destructive and harmful - and it is good to see this potential threat removed from the community.

As small as this bust is by global standards, 1,400 grams in a couple of months is a record for Samoa (there were only two convictions for methamphetamine possession in Samoa in 2017). Perhaps it is inevitable that we will see an increase in seizures. As COVID-19 ravishes the economy and exacerbates inequality, some may look to less than legal means to supplement their dwindling incomes, and drug use is known to increase in communities facing economic hardship. Governments need to work to reduce drug consumption – especially with respect to more harmful substances like meth and opioids, which have devastated poor communities around the world. For example, there were more than 67,000 overdose deaths in the US alone in 2018. Thankfully, so far, Samoa has avoided this degree of harm.

But while it is sometimes tempting to “crack down” (no pun intended) in the face of an emerging perceived threat, we must resist the urge to increase legal penalties. We should be decriminalizing drug use and possession. Drugs are a serious health and social issue, not a moral one. Reducing consumption requires a health and socially focused response, not moral panic. This must include carefully thought out laws that emphasize prevention, education and harm reduction. We need properly funded community based support services that help and protect vulnerable people, and assist them in escaping degrading and difficult circumstances. Stopping drug use will not be achieved through hastily drafted legislation that further criminalizes addiction. By discouraging the demand for drugs, we can actually be more effective in tackling drug trafficking and putting an end to the human suffering caused by increased consumption.

Drug use is a health issue – we need to decriminalize

The first international conference on the legalization of cannabis and its derivatives in Kyrgyz Republic will be held on March 10, 2021 in Bishkek. The event will be streamed online on the YouTube channel of the 

The world-renowned narcologist professor Zhenishbek Nazaraliev is the main speaker of the event. Professor Nazaraliev is a psychiatrist working on drug dependence.

The conference participants will discuss the benefits for the legalization – starting with the adoption of cannabis in industry and ending with its decriminalization for personal use. Particular attention will be paid to the medical and scientific uses of hemp.

Professor Nazaraliev will deliver his professional point of view on the ongoing discussion in Kyrgyz Republic and answer the following questions:

Why did the talks about the legalization begin in Kyrgyz Republic? What is behind this?

Is it possible to overcome poverty and extreme deprivation in Kyrgyz Republic by starting a new industry which is dynamically being developed in the USA, European Union, Russia, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan?

Will this mega-project be able to change the entire nation’s mind and bring the people of Kyrgyz Republic to well-being and prosperity?

March 10, 2021 at 9:00 p.m. Bishkek (15:00 GMT). Address: (Asanbay Center)
Online: https://www.youtube.com/user/DoctorLifeTV For all queries, please contact outofdrug@mail.ru

International conference on cannabis legalisation held in Kyrgyzstan

On the 26th of December 2020, an international seminar marked the launch of a pilot project, the Centre of Excellence for Illicit Drug Supply Reduction, a partnership between the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Brazilian National Office on Drug Policies (SENAD, in the Portuguese acronym), with support from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The pilot stage is planned to last for 18 months, and the Centre is expected to be incorporated by the Ministry of Justice and Public Security. It goes without saying, of course, that the language adopted by the Centre describes illegal drugs themselves—and not prohibitionism, punitivism, and incarceration—as a social problem to be overcome by reducing supply.

There are many issues with this infelicitous partnership. On the ideological level, it lays bare the will of the Brazilian far-right to confirm its bias and prove that there is an epidemic of drug misuse in Brazil that would legitimise the use of force for combating the supply and use of illicit substances. The recent censorship of Fiocruz’s large-scale study on the use of illicit substances in Brazil tells a lot about this stance.

Another point to consider is that a partnership with a UN agency lends international support to Bolsonaro’s draconian drug policies. The UNODC has been supporting decriminalisation and decarceration in the last decade—a stance that has caused polemic in the recent past—, something very distant from Bolsonaro’s drug policies, but its programmes aimed at the Global South are still strongly oriented towards building capacity for law enforcement instead of focusing on other areas of social care that have been delegated to the field of policing over the years. It is not a coincidence that the seminar that inaugurated the Centre of Excellence for Illicit Drug Supply Reduction gathered many professionals linked to the police forces and the penitentiary system, with few researchers present.

Will the UN revamp its disastrous 'drug-free world' campaign in Brazil?

Civil society has, rightly, long been an integral part of CND proceedings and debates – engaging alongside member states, UN officials, academics and others through interventions, side events, disseminating materials, and holding bilateral meetings. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the 64th CND (12-16 April 2021) will take a “hybrid” format – with the vast majority of participants from outside of Vienna participating online.

With the precise modalities of a hybrid Commission still to be announced, the Vienna NGO Committee on Drugs (VNGOC)1 would like to make the following practical and realistic recommendations to ensure strong and meaningful civil society participation – despite the many challenges that exist. We acknowledge the hard work of the CND Secretariat, Bureau and others towards this, but also believe that an online CND should be an opportunity to expand participation, rather than limit it. Furthermore, 2021 could be a good opportunity to implement permanent procedures to facilitate the active, online participation of NGOs from around the world in 2022 and beyond.

VNGOC position statement: Urgent recommendations to protect civil society participation at the 64th UN Commission on Narcotics Drugs (CND)

By Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime

In line with the Congress’s theme of advancing the UN’s Agenda 2030 through crime prevention and criminal justice, the Kyoto Declaration does reflect progress in the way organized crime is understood as a blocker and disruptor of sustainable development. However, it does not align that understanding with innovative or holistic approaches, instead cementing a focus on law enforcement and criminal justice, and assigning states the role of lead responders. At the multilateral level, the document also sticks to familiar positions placing the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and its policy fora at the centre of the response rather than prioritizing interagency and cross-UN cooperation.

It outlines a range of threats and reaffirms existing and manifold law enforcement and criminal justice responses. It does not, however, provide a strategic vision of how the international community could respond in a more holistic and whole-of-society way. This is not surprising, as the negotiation and preparatory process was largely closed to civil society.

Kyoto Declaration - States affirm their primacy in crime prevention and criminal justice amid downgraded role of civil society

The House of Representatives passed a bill providing for legal presumption on who is considered an importer, financier, or protector of illegal drugs – meaning suspects would be presumed guilty upon apprehension.

On Tuesday, March 2, lawmakers approved on final reading House Bill (HB) No 7814, which aimed to give more teeth to Republic Act No. 9165 or the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act of 2002.

A total of 188 legislators – a majority of whom are allies of President Rodrigo Duterte – voted in favor of HB 7814, while only 11 voted no and 9 abstained.

The Duterte-controlled House approved the bill just days after the shootout between agents of the Philippine National Police and the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency – the vanguards of Duterte’s landmark but deadly campaign against illegal drugs.

Most of the House members who opposed the bill or abstained from the vote raised red flags over the HB 7814’s provisions that presumes the guilt of drug suspects without proper investigation by law enforcement agents.

House committee on human rights chair Jesus “Bong” Suntay voted against the bill since it contained 20 presumptions of guilt on drug-related criminal acts that would result to a penalty of life imprisonment.

House OKs bill that presumes drug suspects guilty until proven innocent in the Philippines

The prospect of safe consumption sites (SCS) for mitigating the United States’ historic overdose death toll has long been delayed by the federal obstruction of a Philadelphia-based organization’s bid to open the first sanctioned site. Now, hope may be found a few states over: Rhode Island, where residents are witnessing an exacerbated fatal overdose crisis amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

A bill to authorize the creation of SCS, or what the lawmakers are calling “Harm Reduction Centers,” has returned to the state’s General Assembly after first being introduced in 2019. This time, “there’s really been strong support,” Haley McKee, co-chair of the Substance Use Policy, Education, & Recovery PAC and a lobbyist in support of the newly reintroduced H 5245 and S 0016, told 

. “I’ve seen a lot more involvement of people with lived or professional expertise.”

On February 23, the state Senate passed S 0016, which would establish an advisory committee to make recommendations to the state health department’s director on regulating SCS. However, it’s unclear when the House Committee on Health and Human Services—which is currently reviewing the chamber’s version, H 5245—will vote on it, much less when it will move to a floor vote.

If the House passes H 5245, and the legislation is signed by Governor Gina Raimondo, Rhode Island could be first state to legalize SCS. Lawmakers are defining the “Harm Reduction Centers” as “community based resource[s] for health screening, disease prevention and recovery assistance where persons may safely consume pre-obtained controlled substances.”

Unlike the House version, the Senate bill stipulates a liability protection explicitly shielding from arrest and prosecution at least “property owners, managers, employees, volunteers, clients or participants, and state, city, or town government employees acting in the course and scope of employment.”

Will Rhode Island be the first state to legalise safe consumption sites?

A series of protests which began on January 15 in various cities and neighborhoods across the country have largely focused on economic inequality and police repression. But recently, some of those protesting have revived an old demand of decriminalizing cannabis usage. One event appears to have pushed some to take up this demand again with renewed visibility in the streets and on social media: on January 21, 2021 a judge in El Kef handed out 30-year jail sentences to three young men for cannabis consumption in a public place.

Law 52 passed in 1992 criminalizes more than 130 narcotics from cocaine to cannabis with no apparent distinctions made between the substances.

According to a statement by Faouzi Dhaouadi, the State’s assistant prosecutor at El Kef’s Court of First Instance, the as-yet unnamed individuals who were sentenced had already been in pretrial detention for a year and half and received the maximum sentence under article 11 of Law 52 because they were in a sports stadium—a circumstance that allows a judge to add 20 years to the five for consumption and five for possession covered in other articles of the law. An appeal scheduled to take place on February 16 was postponed to March 9.

Demonstrators in front of the National Theater in downtown Tunis on February 6, 2021. Photo by Fadil Aliriza.

Meshkal spoke with several people who participated in recent protests in downtown Tunis who were calling for authorities to not enforce Law 52.

“People from poorer backgrounds are definitely more singled out through this law, because if you put them in jail, they will not ask for employment,” said 25-year old cannabis user Fatma (not her real name).

Fatma said she began using cannabis for therapeutic reasons about five years ago.

“I just use it to feel better and sleep better,” she said.

As of late 2015, a Human Rights Watch report found that about 5200 out of 7451 people in jail for drug-related offences were there for using or possessing cannabis. The same report noted that those 7451 people in jail for drug-related offenses represented 28 percent of the country’s total prison population, and of them 98 percent were men.

“My fear has certainly gotten bigger with the current situation… since they [the police] hunted down the person whose picture was taken while rolling a joint in a protest, then it definitely means that they are targeting those people,” Fatma said.

Meanwhile, Fatma believes that it’s hypocritical for police to arrest young men for cannabis usage because she thinks that there are police who also use cannabis.

After 30-year jail sentence for cannabis users, some demand decriminalization in Tunis

The survey, involving a quarter of a million people, was carried out last month by a parliamentary fact-finding mission, which showed that more than 80 percent of those polled agree that consumption and production should be allowed, governed by law.

“We now know that the legalisation of cannabis is no longer a taboo in France and that our fellow citizens are observing the ineffectiveness of the current legislation in the matter,” said LREM MP Caroline Janvier in a statement.

However, only 14 percent believe it should be decriminalised, while nearly five percent believe sanctions against it should be strengthened, but less than one percent believe that France should keep the legal framework the way it is now.

Most French people in favour of legalising cannabis, parliamentary survey finds

By The Editorial Board / Maggie MacPherson, Globe and Mail

Sophie Breen suffered through trauma and mental illness and pursued a degree in social work. She died at 27. Nick Crazy Bull was a musician and a gamer. He died at 19. Christopher Martin worked as a mine millwright. He died at 40.

Ms. Breen, Mr. Crazy Bull and Mr. Martin are three names on a list that is far too long and getting longer every day – the toll of Canada’s overdose epidemic. Overdoses have killed more than 20,000 Canadians since 2016. Last weekend, The Globe and Mail presented the stories of 100 people who were lost in 2020 to overdoses, because last year was Canada’s worst year yet.

Most governments in Canada have been too slow to respond to an epidemic that shows no signs of abating. There are no magic solutions and no single policy that can instantly reverse the tide, but health experts have long advocated for changes such as drug decriminalization and access to a safer supply of drugs as two important measures that could save lives.

The severity of the epidemic has led to a shift in recent months. Many political leaders previously rejected policies such as decriminalization and safer supply, but the ideas are now, to a growing extent, embraced. The debate is no longer stuck on whether an idea is worth trying. It is more and more about how best to do it.

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