The Ana Liffey Drug Project: "If You Bang It, Bin It"

The Ana Liffey Drug Project's Peer Support Group is a well established programme designed to enable active drug users to spread Harm Reduction messages throughout the drug using community. The programme is set out over an eight week period and involves two morning sessions a week - Tuesday and Friday. The sessions include group work, outside speakers and talks from staff members on key drug issues. The course recognises the reality of the lifestyles of people who actively use drugs. The structure has been designed to be very flexible - participants have input into the topics to be covered, and the group is open access. The Peer Support Group also plays a valuable role in informing Ana Liffey's service delivery, through their 'Duck, Dive & Survive' resources. In 2009, Peer Support Group resources won a health literacy award.

Towards the end of 2009 the Ana Liffey Drug Project raised the issue of unsafe disposal of drug paraphernalia at a number of forums including the Peer Support Group. The Peer Support Group was concerned that people who did not dispose of their works appropriately were putting other people at risk. With this in mind the group were invited to work on a poster as part of their 'Duck, Dive & Survive' campaign.

Read more on the Ana Liffey Drug Project website here. Good stuff!

World AIDS Day 2009: The War on Drugs is NOT WORKING

(December 1, 2009, London) - Governments worldwide should take urgent action to reform punitive drug laws, disproportionate penalties, and harsh and discriminatory law enforcement practices as part of their efforts to address HIV among people who use drugs, Human Rights Watch and the International Harm Reduction Association said today, World AIDS Day. Current policies also cause needless suffering among people living with HIV/AIDS, the two groups said in a joint briefing note released today.

International health and drug control agencies - including the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, UNAIDS, UNICEF, the United Nations Development Program, and the World Health Organization - all endorse comprehensive harm reduction services as the best ways to address HIV among people who use drugs, including those in detention. These services include needle and syringe exchange, medication-assisted therapy (for example, with methadone), and peer outreach and education programs. Notwithstanding broad endorsement and overwhelming scientific evidence that these approaches work, they are out of reach for the vast majority of people who need them.

• For the complete story posted on the Human Rights Watch website click here.

Need More Convincing? Read "The Needle Nexus"

New York Times Magazine, November 17, 2009 - Needle exchange is AIDS prevention that works. While no one wants to have to put on a condom, every drug user prefers injecting with a clean needle. In 2003, an academic review of 99 cities around the world found:

• cities with needle exchange saw their H.I.V. rates among injecting drug users drop 19 percent a year.
• cities without needle exchange had an 8 percent increase per year.

Contrary to popular fears, needle exchange has not led to more drug use or higher crime rates. Studies have also found that drug addicts participating in needle ­exchanges are more likely to enter rehabilitation programs. Using needle exchange as part of a comprehensive attack on H.I.V. is endorsed by virtually every relevant United Nations and United States-government agency.

Drug injectors don’t pass infection only among themselves. Through their sex partners, H.I.V. is spread into the general population. In many countries, the H.I.V. epidemic began among drug injectors. In Russia in 2000, for example, needle-sharing was directly responsible for more than 95 percent of all cases of H.I.V. infection. So virtually all those with H.I.V. in Russia can trace their infection to a shared needle not many generations back. Though it has been scorned as special treatment for a despised population, AIDS prevention for drug users is in fact crucial to preventing a wider epidemic.

Read the complete story in The New York Times Magazine here.