Call for nominations - International Rolleston Award 2015

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Call for nominations - International Rolleston Award 2015

23 September 2015
Harm Reduction International (HRI)

HRI is inviting nominatons for the 2015 International Rolleston Award.

This award was first presented at the ‘3rd International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harm’ in Melbourne in 1992. Each year, it is given to an individual or organisation whose contribution to reducing the harms from psychoactive substances has international significance.

For the purposes of the Rolleston Award, ‘international significance’ should reflect:

1) The pioneering nature of the work

2) Demonstrating courage or leadership in performance of the work

3) The resilience of the individual or organisation

4) The impact of the work

For the 2015 award HRI is specifically inviting nominations of persons or organisations working at grassroots level.

Please submit nomination by 1 October to rick.lines@ihra.net.

The nomination should include a short explanation of why the person or organisation is being nominated. In addition, each nomination should include two referees in addition to the nominator.

The award is named after Sir Humphrey Rolleston, President of the Royal College of Physicians who chaired the UK Departmental Committee on Morphine and Heroin Addiction. In 1926 this committee concluded that the prescription of heroin or morphine could be regarded as legitimate medical treatment for those in whom withdrawal produces serious symptoms that cannot be treated satisfactorily under normal practice and, for those for who are able to lead a useful and fairly normal life so long as they take a certain non-progressive quantity, usually small, of the drug of addiction, but cease to be able to do so when the regular allowance is withdrawn. This decision epitomises a benign, pragmatic and humane approach to drug problems, and was a landmark event in the history of harm reduction.

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