Denying harm reduction services to injecting drug users is contributing to the transmission of HIV and constitutes a violation of human rights says a new report released today by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).
Launched for World AIDS Day, the new report, Out of harm’s way, examines the extent to which governments and donors are failing injecting drug users by imprisoning them and denying them access to the health services they need – including substitution therapy, and needle and syringe exchange programmes – and otherwise contravening their rights to health and personal security.
“We at the IFRC are hoping that this report will shine a light on one of the more flagrant violations of the human rights of people who are already highly stigmatized,” says IFRC President Tadateru Konoé.
“The increasing rate of HIV infection among injecting drug users not only constitutes a public health emergency, but is also evidence of the gross neglect and discrimination that drug-dependent individuals must struggle with every single day.
The IFRC is focusing on injecting drug users because a growing body of evidence shows that failing to reach them with harm reduction programmes not only jeopardizes their own health, but also the safety of the public at large,” he adds.
The report highlights that more than 3 million of the world’s estimated 15.9 million injecting drug users are now living with HIV. Although five countries – China, Malaysia, Russia, Ukraine and Viet Nam – are home to the highest number of HIV-positive drug users, the numbers are also rising in Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, South Asia, and central and east Asia. The report has a special focus on eastern Europe and central Asia where as many as 60 per cent of all injecting drug users are HIV positive, and where laws and policies continue to single out users for stigma, incarceration and harassment. In Ukraine, the number of HIV-positive injecting drug users is so high that the country is edging dangerously towards a generalized epidemic.
In eastern Europe and the Russian Federation, we are now witnessing worrying levels of HIV transmission from injecting drug users into the general population. In contrast, in countries that emphasize harm reduction over criminalization, the situation is significantly different: HIV rates have stabilized and there is virtually no transmission into the general population.
The IFRC strongly calls upon governments and donors to exert all possible efforts to make available a comprehensive harm reduction programmes for drug users. To make such programmes sustainable, however, governments need to commit to predictable long-term funding.
The new report notes that, to date, current spending on harm reduction programmes is only 1.4 per cent of the total 11.3 billion US dollars spent overall on HIV and AIDS programmes, which is negligible compared to what is needed.
Most injecting drug users want to stop but can’t because they have an addiction. Harm reduction works from the premise that addiction is a medical problem and not a moral failure. The IFRC promotes harm reduction for one very simple reason: it works and is a human rights-based approach.