Get to know the principles of risk and harm reduction and learn how to effectively minimize the negative consequences of substance use.
Harm reduction is an approach to the use of psychoactive substances that assumes the right of each individual to decide freely about his or her body and mind. In this sense, it promotes informed consumption that enables responsible and safe decisions for the people who decide to use them and their communities. In practice, it translates into private strategies and public policies aimed at minimizing their negative consequences.
In the non-coercive search for the lowest possible costs derived from practices such as the use of drugs by adults who decide to use them. The above, based on informed and objective knowledge about their effects and individual and collective risks.
These strategies vary according to the practice they address; in the case of substance use they vary according to the risks and harms posed by each.
Because it is an approach based on respect for human rights and objective knowledge about private practices such as the use of psychoactive substances. These aspects make its programs a constant success in reducing the negative effects, both at the individual and collective level, of such practices.
Because current policies have failed, while risk and harm reduction programs have offered positive results wherever they have been applied, improving the quality of life of individuals and communities in different parts of the world.
Because they are based on social and scientific evidence, not on moral criteria, which is essential for the design of adequate and efficient health policies.
Because it destigmatizes people who use drugs and makes public services more accessible to them, generating a positive impact on their health and that of their communities.
Although there are several precedents for the application of this approach in public programs and policies, its concept and current forms emerged in the 1980s in Europe. In that context, injecting drug users organized themselves to distribute new syringes and needles to other users in order to reduce the spread of diseases such as HIV and hepatitis caused by the exchange of used materials. The success of this strategy led to its replication in more and more countries. Today there are citizen programs and public policies in this direction all over the world, aimed at the use of legal and illegal substances. The spread of risk and harm reduction has been characterized by the replication of its successful results.
The examples in this sense are many and very diverse. Some of the main ones are:
– For people with intravenous opioid dependence, in addition to the distribution of sterile materials, there is the use of naloxone, a substance that reverses the process of heroin overdose. There is also the use of methadone, which reduces withdrawal symptoms.
– For the use of illegal drugs in general, there are citizen chemical analysis services, through which users acquire objective information about the real content of their substances. This allows them to decide more consciously and responsibly about their consumption.
– In Mexico there are public policies with a focus on risk and harm reduction for the use of legal drugs such as alcohol and tobacco, for example alcohol breathalyzer tests to reduce the risk of traffic accidents due to alcohol abuse and smoke-free spaces to avoid the harm of second-hand smoke in non-smokers.
– In the case of drugs that are consumed through combustion, such as tobacco and cannabis, there is the alternative of volatilizing their components through the application of controlled heat. This avoids the damage caused by combustion, which is responsible for the main negative consequences of such consumption.
The creation of objective knowledge related to psychoactive substances and their use, through different projects, such as bibliographic research, design and application of surveys and polls, among others.
The dissemination of objective and sustained information on psychoactive substances, their real effects, the individual and collective risks they represent, as well as aspects associated with their history and the cultural and political relations of societies with them. The above through:
– A multidisciplinary database of scientific and outreach materials on our online site
– The organization of forums, congresses and courses with the participation of high-profile specialists.
– The publication of original articles in our online site and other spaces
– The creation and distribution of infographic materials, both physical and virtual, with information related to risk and damage reduction strategies for users.
– Acquiring and disseminating evidence-based, non-stigmatizing knowledge about psychoactive substances and their use.
– Informing yourself about risk and harm reduction, its programs, its results, and spreading this knowledge in your community.
– If you are a user: by setting an example, through the informed and responsible practice of your consumption.
– Demanding the authorities to implement the risk and damage reduction approach in public programs and policies.
– Approaching and collaborating with civil society organizations that work and promote risk and harm reduction.
– RIA Institute: http://institutoria.org
– Pour: http://www.verter.org.mx
– Drug Science: https://www.drugscience.org.uk
– Energy Control: http://energycontrol.org
– Échele Cabeza: http://www.echelecabeza.com
– Soma Project: http://proyectosoma.com
– Dance Safe: http://dancesafe.org
– Harm Reduction International: http://hri.global
– National Harm Reduction Coalition: https://www.nchrc.org
– Transnational Institute: http://tni.org
– International Network of People who Use Drugs: http://inpud.net
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Copyright © 2024 Centro de Libertad Responsable
