john james at AIDS treatment news: int'l drug war clashes with AIDS fight

Drug War Clashes With Fight Against HIV/AIDS

Posted: 03 Oct 2007 06:27 PM CDT

Inter Press Service October 3, 2007

Posted by John S James at 7:20 PM

AIDS Treatment News Daily Alerts


"For more than two decades, the Geneva-based International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) has tried to discourage nations from developing harm reduction programmes and other HIV/AIDS prevention programmes. ...

"In March 2007, the INCB made public statements which were widely covered by Canadian media against Insite, North America's only supervised injection located in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside neighbourhood. ...

"Insite presently has over 800 users a day and has, according to 20 peer-reviewed academic studies, reduced public drug use, reduced dangerous syringe sharing, reduced HIV/AIDS and reduced publicly discarded syringes. Overdose deaths have also decreased in the four-and-a-half years it has been in operation. ...

"INCB Board meetings are also closed to the public and no minutes are available. Critics have argued that none of the members of the INCB have expertise in health, international law or human rights."

from http://aids-write.org

stealing your breath to birmingham: citizen journalism at icpoz.three — eleven posts, one sentence, one tale retold (368.1)

insite, located in vancouver, bc, canada, is the only safe injection site in north america. this is an excerpt from the august 31, 2006 insite fact sheet, posted by a nameless “third year bsc. (nursing) student at university of ottawa in collaboration with algonquin college. i had the opportunity to go to insite this summer and really get an idea of the effect this resource has in the downtown eastside community. there were over 800 visits to the site the day before my tour.”

facts and figures (from insite homepage and pers. comm from my tour)

• people using insite are more likely to enter a detox program, with one in five regular visitors beginning a detox program

• over a two year period 4,084 referrals were made with 40 per cent of them made to addiction counseling

• to date there have been over 500 overdoses at insite. thanks to prompt medical attention there have been no deaths.

• daily average visits: 607

• number of nursing care interventions: 6,227

• number of nursing interventions for abscess care: 2,055

• busiest day: may 25, 2005 (933 visits in 18 hours). So, nearly 1000 needles kept off of the street, nearly 1000 instances where a needle was not shared.1000 instances where an individual had the opportunity to access the healthcare system, not only for drug-related treatment but also for mental health, hiv / aids care, pregnancy testing and maternity care, social work services, counseling and peer-support.

from http://protectinsite.blogspot.com/