INPUD is a global network of people who use and have used drugs. INPUD has an evolving regional network structure and also strong ties with a number of national and local drug user organisations. A key role of the organisation is to support people who use drugs to access and take part in international policy processes.

El INPUD es una red mundial constituida de personas que usan o han usado drogas. Su estructura en red es cambiante. La organización ha desarrollado estrechos vínculos con una serie de organizaciones nacionales y locales cuyos miembros son usuarios de drogas. Uno de los papeles claves de la organización es ayudar a los usuarios de drogas a tener acceso y participar a los procesos de decisión política al nivel internacional..

INPUD est un réseau mondial constitué de personnes qui consomment ou on consommé de la drogue. Sa structure en réseau est en constante évolution. L’organisation a, par ailleurs, développé des liens étroits avec un certain nombre d’organisations nationales et locales constituées d’usagers de drogues. L’un des rôles clés de l’organisation consiste à aider les usagers de drogue à avoir accès et à participer aux processus internationaux de décision.

International Network of People Who Use Drugs (INPUD)

Wednesday, 20th September 2023, 13:30 - 15:00 (Geneva - CET)


Organised by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in collaboration with Albania, Brazil, Colombia, Greece, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay, Portugal, Switzerland, Uruguay, UNAIDS, Amnesty International, Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales, Dejusticia, the Global Commission on Drug Policy, Harm Reduction International, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, the International Drug Policy Consortium, the International Network of People Who Use Drugs and the Open Society Foundation.

The Panel will provide a platform for international human rights experts, representatives of State and civil society organisations to discuss findings and recommendations of the report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on ‘

Human rights challenges in addressing and countering all aspects of the world drug problem

Abdoul Thioye, Chief, Rule of Law, Equality and Non-discrimination Branch, OHCHR

Nekane Lavin, Human Rights Officer, OHCHR

Ann Fordham, Executive Director, International Drug Policy Consortium

Haryati Binti Jonet, Member, Asian Network of People Who Use Drugs

José Ignacio Juarèz Garcia, Director, Human Rights, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mexico

Hélène Tigroudja, Member, Human Rights Committee

Suki Beavers, Director, Gender Equality, Human Rights and Community Engagement, UNAIDS

Diego García-Sayán, Commissioner, Global Commission on Drug Policy

Special event: Human rights challenges in addressing and countering all aspects of the world drug problem

In 2016, INPUD commissioned a project that used in-depth, qualitative interviews with twenty peer drug user activists and harm reduction specialists from a range of different countries to develop a comprehensive set of seventeen key harm reduction interventions based on ‘best and worst practices’ in these areas. The result was a “Harm Reduction Best Practices Tool Kit”, intended for harm reduction service providers around the world.

The document focuses on three key harm reduction interventions:

Opioid and Stimulant Agonist Therapies (OATs/SATs)

The intention of this brief is to provide globally relevant recommendations for best practices in harm reduction policy and programming while drawing attention to some of the main obstacles that currently hamper these efforts. Peer-based expertise is utilised to provide an insider inventory of best and worst practices in the three harm reduction interventions identified above. These peer-informed recommendations are relevant to and centred around the needs and priorities of fellow drug users working in and making use of these programmes and services across the globe.

Although these interviews took place several years ago, it is fair to say that peer-driven advancements within OATs/SATs, NSPs, and ODP interventions around the globe have been slow in coming. This is true both in the general adoption of harm reduction interventions in countries that formerly or currently lack them, as well as within the services of those countries that do provide them. And maddeningly, the majority of harm reduction services continue to be staffed by non-drug users and other professionals and tend to prioritise their needs over those of drug using clients and, where they exist at all, drug using staff members. This continued lack of peer-led interventions means that the feedback of the interviewees continues to hold relevance today and there is much we can take away from it, as the following pages illustrate.

Harm reduction best and worst practice: Peer-informed policy and program recommendations in the time of Covid-19

As organisations that work in drug policy and harm reduction, we welcome the evidence-based proposals in the new report published by the Scottish Government proposing a road map for the future of drug policy and law in Scotland. We share the view of the report that drug policy based on health and human rights achieves better outcomes for individuals, their families, communities and wider society.

In recognition of the damaging global impact of criminalisation, the United Nations 

 a legal and policy position that promotes the reduction of harm and the decriminalisation of people who use drugs. We welcome this report as a step towards the UN’s position, and the development of effective policy and services in Scotland.

Ending criminal sanctions for people in possession of drugs for personal use; the provision of a full range of harm reduction services and support; and improvement in the accessibility and acceptability of treatment services for people who experience drug dependency are all required to address the public health emergency that Scotland has been in for some years.

Scotland has made progress on all these fronts, and yet the prevalence of people experiencing drug dependence, and the number of drug related deaths remain very high by international standards, underpinned by persistent broader health inequalities. Further innovation and investment is clearly required.

We further support the proposed evidence-led review into how the use of drugs, their production and supply could be regulated. This review would inform a debate around wider reforms to drugs legislation.

We welcome the recognition of the harmful role that criminalisation, poverty and stigma, play in the lives of so many. People who use drugs, especially those who experience dependence, face discrimination every day, and the Scottish Government’s desire to end the exclusion of this group from equality legislation is to be commended.

We also welcome the Scottish Government’s acknowledgment and commitment to centring those with living and lived experience in policy making and implementation.

UK legislation and regulations, especially the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, serve as an impediment to many of the urgently needed evidence-based reforms highlighted in the report, including the decriminalisation of drug possession; the provision of supervised drug consumption facilities and drug safety checking services; and even heroin assisted treatment.

Scotland has developed innovative responses using its own legal system, police force, healthcare system and civic society. Progress has already been made in terms of the extension of recorded warnings for drug possession, policing arrangements and the legal basis for injecting equipment provision services and its world-leading take home naloxone programme. Scotland must also use these same assets to deliver supervised drug consumption rooms and drug checking services as a matter of urgency.

Drug-related deaths are at an all-time high, in Scotland and across the UK. The UK Government must either work to reform legislation to enable the vital reforms proposed in this report across all four nations, or sufficiently devolve powers to allow each country to enact these policies themselves in order to save lives, and support communities.

INPUD – International Network of People who Use Drugs

EuroNPUD – European Network of People who Use Drugs

Jason Kew, Senior Innovative Practice Officer,

IDPC joins NGO coalition's response to Scottish Government's report on drug policy reform

In 2022, the World Health Organization (WHO) published the Consolidated guidelines on HIV, viral hepatitis and STI prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care for key populations. These guidelines outline a public health response to HIV, viral hepatitis and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) for five key populations (men who have sex with men, sex workers, people in prisons and other closed settings, people who inject drugs and trans and gender diverse people). 

In this policy brief, we give an update on those parts of the guidelines which are relevant for people who inject drugs.

In many countries drug use or possession is criminalized, and in almost every country it is considered immoral, and significant stigma and discrimination is experienced by people who use drugs. At the time of writing, there is extremely low coverage of the evidence-based package of needle and syringe programmes (NSPs) and opioid agonist maintenance therapy (OAMT). In 2021, of 105 countries that report injecting drug use, NSPs were available in 94, and OAMT available in 90 countries. There are regional differences, with low availability of both interventions in both Africa and the Middle East. Also, in most countries that provide these services, their coverage is too low to have an impact. 

As a direct result, people who inject drugs are disproportionately affected by HIV and viral hepatitis. The World Drug Report 2022 estimated in 2021 that 11.2 million people injected drugs, 5.5 million of them were living with hepatitis C, 1.4 million were living with HIV and 1.2 million were living with both hepatitis C and HIV. The Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) estimated in 2021 that people who injected drugs had a 35 times greater risk of acquiring HIV than people who did not inject drugs, and WHO estimates that 23% of new hepatitis C infections globally are attributable to injecting drugs.

For impact on HIV and viral hepatitis, structural barriers for people who inject drugs need to be addressed, including decriminalizing drug use and possession for personal use, ending forced detention in compulsory drug treatment centres, addressing violence, stigma and discrimination and empowering communities of people who use drugs. People who use drugs face additional barriers to accessing health services where cessation of drug use is a condition for eligibility. Women who inject drugs may be more stigmatized than their male counterparts, and many work as sex workers to pay for both their and their partnerʼs drugs. Fear of losing custody of their children may make mothers who inject drugs less likely to access reproductive and other health services. They may experience more police harassment and violence than men who inject drugs. The impact of these barriers on HIV and viral hepatitis acquisition is clear, and for this reason the enabling interventions listed in the table below are considered essential for impact for people who inject drugs.

Recommended package of interventions for HIV, viral hepatitis and STI prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care for people who inject drugs

Legal and policy frameworks play an important role in protecting and promoting the right to health for people who use drugs by ensuring access to HIV and related services. Conversely, laws that criminalise drug use and aggressive law enforcement, which are both underpinned by and exacerbate stigma, discrimination and violence against people who use drugs, can exacerbate the marginalisation of people who use drugs, create barriers to their access to essential HIV services, harm reduction and protection against overdose and increase the impact of HIV and poor sexual and reproductive health on their lives.

It is recognized that “criminalisation of drug use, restrictive drug policies and aggressive law-enforcement practices are key drivers of HIV and hepatitis C epidemics among people who inject drugs” a view that is shared by several United Nations agencies. The Global Commission on HIV and the Law has recognised that these factors, together with fear of arrest, discrimination, marginalisation, stigmatisation and violence, drive people who inject drugs underground and exclude them from proper access to the harm reduction and health services they need to prevent overdose and protect themselves from HIV and hepatitis C.

The Global Commission on HIV and the Law was an independent body convened by UNDP on behalf of the UNAIDS family from 2010 to 2012. During its 18-month process, the Global Commission examined the impact of laws, policies and practices on HIV in seven regions of the world. The Commission’s report contains evidence that protective legal environments improve the lives of people living with HIV and reduce vulnerability to HIV infection. Across the globe, it also found evidence that stigma, discrimination, punitive laws, police violence and lack of access to justice continue to fuel the HIV epidemic. Laws that criminalise aspects of sex work, same-sex relations and drug use can lead to increased violence and brutality against these key populations, driving them away from health care and harm reduction services.

If we are to improve access to essential HIV services as well as to the harm reduction and health services for people who use drugs, it is critical that we identify the laws, policies and practices that act as barriers to access to these services for people who use drugs and advocate for their removal.

Legal Environment Scan: A drug user-led monitoring toolkit of legal and policy framework

The International Network of Women who Use Drugs (INWUD) is excited to announce the top three winners of the Narcofeminism Blog Competition “Our bodies, Our choice, Our rights, Our voice”

1st Prize Emily Arnold, Junkies, sluts and feminists: where are we in the witch legacy?

2nd Prize Jessica Spratt, Owning My Pleasure

3rd Prize Violet Maodi, Stigma and discrimination have no place in my life

INWUD aims to address the specific needs and rights of women who use drugs and women living with HIV. We do this by providing a women-only safe space for engaging in global advocacy with stakeholders. We believe in meaningful engagement and empowerment of women who use drugs to take control of their own narrative about drug use. To this end, INWUD launched the Narcofeminism blog competition to create space for women to share their rich life experiences and lessons learned. The diversity and breadth of all these stories and life lessons have the capacity to change the lives of other women while challenging public perception and stereotypes about women who use drugs.

Women assert their voices in conversations about drug use

The Global Fund invests more than US$4 billion a year to support programmes in more than 100 low-and-middle-income countries and is committed to protecting and promoting human rights, including of key populations. It is therefore critical that corruption, fraud, human rights violations, mismanagement, and misuse of Global Fund funding are reported, investigated, and resolved. The Global Fund has charged the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) with the responsibility to investigate irregularities in programmes it supports and to provide effective complaints mechanisms for whistle-blowers to report all wrongdoings relating to Global Fund activities. The main objective of the mechanism is to ensure equal access to high quality services and programmes for all, and to provide communities with a secure communication channel to voice their concerns regarding alleged offences.

The OIG is independent of the Global Fund Secretariat. It reports directly to the Global Fund Board through its Audit and Finance Committee. This is to ensure transparency and objectivity of its work and to improve accountability of the Global Fund work at the national level and in the Secretariat.

The OIG’s mandate is wider than investigations. It also includes internal audits, in-country reviews, inspections, and counter-fraud, among others. However, this guide focuses only on the investigation side of the OIG work and explains step by step how people who use drugs can use this mechanism effectively to report human right violations, fraud, corruption, and other wrongdoings. To learn more what the OIG understands as wrongdoings, read the ‘What wrongdoings can you report?’ section below.

To encourage more people (whistle-blowers) to report any alleged wrongdoings and to promote the complaints mechanism, the OIG has launched the ‘I Speak Out’ campaign and e-learning platform. Visit their website ispeakoutnow.org to learn about different types of wrongdoings, read case studies, and to file a complaint. You can also find tips and advice on how to do it effectively as outlined in the report.

Global Fund Complaints Mechanism: How can people who use drugs use it effectively?

In this short film we summarise what the community of people who use drugs in Portugal acknowledges about the famous drug policy model of Portugal, but also what they would like to see improved.

The Portuguese drug policy model is often highlighted as the principal model of progressive drug policy. The country’s decision to decriminalise drug use in 2001 had indeed many positive impacts upon the health and wellbeing of people who use drugs, but the number of people convicted for the crime of drug consumption is raising again. To paint a picture of the portuguese legislation as perfect, or a magic wand that addresses all the issues around drugs, would be a mistake. Drugreporter co-produced this new short film with 

Decriminalisation in Portugal: Through the lens of people who use drugs

Making the most of civil society participation in the development of a general comment on “impacts of drug policies on economic, social and cultural rights”

In October 2022, the UN Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (CESCR) decided to initiate work on a new General comment on the “impacts of drug policies on economic, social and cultural rights.” This joint briefing includes an overview of likely next steps in the drafting process and suggested themes that the Comment may address. This briefing was produced jointly with the International Network of People who Use Drugs (INPUD), Amnesty International, Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales (CELS), and the International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC).

“General comments” are authoritative interpretations by treaty bodies of thematic issues or provisions of human rights treaties - in this case, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which is one of the core international human rights treaties and has been ratified by 171 countries. The aim of general comments is to clarify the duties of countries that have ratified the treaties with respect to specific provisions, in this way helping State parties better implement the rights enshrined in the treaties. For civil society, a general comment is a powerful tool to advocate for reform and hold authorities accountable. 

Each Committee sets up the process for drafting a General Comment, and no official timeline has been published yet for the discussion of this particular one. Based on CESCR practice, the drafting process for this new Comment is expected to include the following steps, although specific times and elements of the process can change: 

Selection of Committee drafting group / Rapporteur(s) by CESCR; 

Call for written inputs on the situation of human rights impact to drug policies, topics or issues to be covered by the Comment, and any other relevant information; 

Development of a CESCR Working Paper as the basis for discussing the content of the Comment; 

Regional and/or global consultations with communities and civil society, experts, and academia; 

Publication of a first draft of the Comment; 

Day of General Discussion. These Days normally include panel discussions on specific themes and/or questions and are preceded by written contributions; 

In-depth discussion of the text and potential call for written inputs on the first draft; 

Call for written contributions, and possibly more consultations, on the revised draft; 

Deliberation and adoption by the Committee. It is our understanding that the General Comment would likely be finalised by the end of 2024, subject to confirmation by the CESCR Secretariat

International Network of People Who Use Drugs (INPUD)

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