Annexation of Crimea will cut off 14.000 drug users from critical HIV prevention services

News

Annexation of Crimea will cut off 14.000 drug users from critical HIV prevention services

2 April 2014

Some 800 patients in the region are currently receiving opioid substitution therapy (OST). This treatment is prohibited in Russia and current stocks of methadone and buprenorphine on the Crimean peninsula will only last for another few weeks at most. With the blocking of highways that connect Crimea to the mainland, getting medical supplies through is challenging and there are concerns that a major public health crisis will arise as a result.

According to Andriy Klepikov, Executive Director of the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine (pictured above): “When the supply of these medicines is interrupted or stopped, a medical emergency will ensue as hundreds of OST patients go into withdrawal, which will inevitably lead to a drastic increase in both acute illness as well as increases in injecting as people seek to self medicate.

“The Russian Federation has extremely repressive drug laws,” he said, “and its punitive approach to people who use drugs means that it now experiences one of the highest rates of new HIV infections in the world. Injecting drug users represent nearly 80 percent of all HIV cases in the country. ”

The Alliance expressed alarm at the future of people who inject drugs in Crema following its annexation by Russia.

Please, click here to read the full article.

Keep up-to-date with drug policy developments by subscribing to the IDPC Monthly Alert.