The idea of certain drugs as bad, dangerous and requiring prohibition by law it is a relatively recent social phenomenon, with the first international laws prohibiting drugs only appearing at the start of the twentieth century. Since then, the so-called War on Drugs has become a huge driver for the worlds ever-growing prison population, with more than 1 in 8 of all prisoners currently incarcerated in British prisons serving their sentences for drug offences.

The War on Drugs has also been shown to have a shocking bias regarding racial disproportionality. Black people are recorded as being so over-represented in cannabis prosecutions, making up a quarter of those convicted of cannabis possession, even though they comprise less than 4 percent of the UK’s total population. The picture is even worst in the United States, with black men having been admitted to prison on drugs charges at rates of 20 to 50 times that of white men, despite the fact that there is no discernible discrepancy regarding the use, supply or production of prohibited substances amongst different racialised groups.

Decades of prohibition’s failure to reduce the drug trade – combined with the increasingly negative impacts of growing incarceration, violence and addiction – has led to many finally breaking with the War on Drugs consensus and openly calling for, and eventually implementing, different approaches to the question of hitherto illegal drugs, with major developments in countries such as Uruguay, Canada, Luxembourg, and some states in the US.

Cannabis and capitalism: The question of ownership within drug policy reform

The Andrey Rylkov Foundation has decided to limit access to its website with materials on Russian and international drug policy, health and human rights resources for people who use drugs. We have decided to temporarily shut down our website in light of a new government attack on the organization.

On Thursday, April 16th the major Russian government-owned news channel Rossiya-24 ran a prime-time news piece where they accused the Andrey Rylkov Foundation of distributing ‘narco-propaganda’, a couple of days after the Federal News Agency (RIAFAN) had run an “investigation” with similar accusations. The investigation was prompted by an earlier news piece, “Thousands on methadone withdrawals”, published by opposition outlet Mediazona, where ARF has shared the challenges we face during the COVID-19 crisis providing assistance to people who use drugs. The Mediazona news piece described people who use drugs as one of the most vulnerable populations, especially in Russia, where they don’t have access to effective drug treatments based on globally-recognised science and medicine and instead are forced into painful withdrawals.

The next day, Vasiliy Piskarev, the chair of the State Duma Security Committee, published a statement on the Duma website accusing us of attempting to decriminalize drug use and promoting drugs propaganda, and informs that he had passed this information onto the authorities in order to initiate a new series of check-ups.

Russian NGO accused of “narco-propaganda” over COVID-19 advocacy for people who use drugs

People being treated for opioid addiction risk relapsing without changes in their support and treatment during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Royal Australasian College of Physicians spokesman and president-elect of the Chapter of Addiction Medicine Professor Nicholas Lintzeris said the outbreak has had a huge impact on the 50,000 patients who use methadone or buprenorphine as treatment for their opioid dependence.

“Traditionally that usually meant patients got to a clinic, pharmacy or hospital, four, five, six, seven days a week in some cases,” he said.

“That might be fine under normal circumstances but in the context of COVID-19 that’s a model that doesn’t really work that well.”

Australia: Opioid addiction treatment must change during pandemic, experts say

By Giada Girelli / Harm Reduction International

In a mere few weeks, COVID-19 has drastically reshaped our way of living and has brought to light the many limitations of how societies detain and incarcerate people.

With physical distancing in prisons nearly impossible, prisons have rightly become a central topic of conversation. Overcrowded and lacking in basic hygiene and sanitation, they are inadequate to protect the health of prisoners and staff, and are thus reservoirs for the spread of communicable diseases like COVID-19. Approaches to other detention settings, such as immigration or juvenile detention centres, are also being scrutinised.

But there is one detention setting that has been virtually absent from media coverage and policy discussion, despite imposing conditions of detention that are, in some cases, even worse than prison – drug detention and rehabilitation centres.

Drug Detention Centres Operate Around The World

Information on drug detention centres is disturbingly scarce. Over 450,000 people are estimated to be detained in government-run drug treatment facilities in Asia alone – that’s close to half a million people in just one continent, who we have little data about. And this figure doesn’t include private drug treatment and rehabilitation centres which operate around the world, in addition to or instead of public centres.

Most of the people at these drug detention and rehabilitation centres have ended up there involuntarily. Some have been mandated to be ‘rehabilitated’ after a conviction for drug use or drug possession, while others have been detained following mandatory drug testing or as a result of reporting by family members to the authorities


COVID-19 decarceration: The detention centres nobody is talking about

By Eva Vergara & Maria Verza / Associated Press News

The spreading specter of the new coronavirus is shaking Latin America’s notoriously overcrowded, unruly prisons, threatening to turn them into infernos.

The Puente Alto prison in downtown Santiago, Chile, had the largest of Latin America’s largest prison virus outbreaks so far, with more than 300 reported cases. The prison’s 1,100 inmates are terrified. Social distancing is hard to practice in jail.

“They are all in contact with each other,” said prison nurse Ximena Graniffo.

Any efforts at reducing contact were blown away in El Salvador over the weekend when authorities crammed prisoners — albeit wearing masks — tightly together in prison yards while searching their cells. President Nayib Bukele ordered the crackdown after more than 20 people were murdered in the country Friday and intelligence suggested the orders came from imprisoned gang leaders.

Latin America’s prisons hold 1.5 million inmates, and the facilities are often quasi-ruled by prisoners themselves because of corruption, intimidation and inadequate guard staffs. Low budgets also create ideal conditions for the virus to spread: There is often little soap and water and cell blocks are crowded.

Virus spreads fear through Latin America’s unruly prisons

В нынешнем контексте коронавирусной инфекции COVID-19 люди, употребляющие наркотики, сталкиваются с уникальными потребностями и рисками из-за криминализации, стигмы, дискриминации, сопутствующих проблем со здоровьем, социальной маргинализации и более высокой экономической и социальной уязвимости, включая отсутствие доступа к адекватному жилью и медицинскому обслуживанию. Необходимо продолжить предоставлять им услуги по лечению и снижению вреда.

16 апреля 2020 – В настоящее время коронавирусная инфекция COVID-19 является глобальной чрезвычайной ситуацией в области общественного здравоохранения, создающей беспрецедентные проблемы и новые уязвимости, а также усугубляющей уже существующие. Ситуация, вызванная пандемией COVID-19, требует от стран принятия чрезвычайных мер для защиты здоровья и благополучия населения. COVID-19 по-разному повлияет на каждую отдельную страну в зависимости от инфраструктуры здравоохранения, распространения вируса, политического, экономического и социального контекста, а также от подготовленности страны.

По мере распространения коронавирусной инфекции COVID-19 все наши усилия должны быть направлены на замедление ее распространения и обеспечение того, чтобы наиболее уязвимые люди получали защиту и уход, на которые они имеют право. Предотвращение распространения этого вируса требует всеобщего охвата и обеспечения справедливого и недискриминационного доступа к информации, профилактике, медицинскому обслуживанию и лечению для всех людей, независимо от их гражданства, национальности или миграционного статуса.

Заявление эксперта ООН по праву на здоровье о защите людей, употребляющих наркотики, во время пандемии COVID-19

In mid-March, as the Covid-19 pandemic was accelerating, Shantae Owens found a man unconscious in a public bathroom in Tompkins Square Park, in New York’s East Village. Owens wasn’t surprised at his discovery. He was on street outreach distributing naloxone, which helps reverse opioid overdoses, as well as syringes, condoms, and other health supplies. He administered naloxone and called 911. The ambulance took longer to arrive than usual.

Owens is an outreach worker with the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center, which has temporarily stopped doing outreach due to Covid-19-related safety concerns. But he still covers the parks, public restrooms, and drug houses of the South Bronx, Washington Heights, and Lower Manhattan as a volunteer with VOCAL-NY, a grassroots organization that grew out of the AIDS epidemic and is staying open during the lockdown. Many harm reduction programs are still running as essential services, though others, such as those that operate out of county health departments, like Michigan’s, are now largely closed because of Covid-19. Owens is concerned about what the lockdown will mean for drug users—in particular, for people who use opioids and are at high risk of fatal overdose. “We fear that overdose is going to rise,” Owens told me, “because there’s not enough services. We’ve already lost so many people to the overdose crisis.”

Around the country, organizations that work to reduce drug-related harms such as overdose, HIV, and hepatitis C are now facing yet another devastating virus. And for active drug users, people in drug treatment, and people without stable housing, business closures and physical distancing mandates are causing a cascade of economic and practical difficulties that compound health dangers. “I worry for my community,” said Kelly Culbert, who works at NYHRE, an East Harlem harm reduction center that has closed temporarily. “They’re scared. They have very little access to equipment [for safer drug use]. And everything has become more problematic—from the ways people were making their money to locating a dealer and that person having an adequate supply. It’s all become riskier, less available.”

US: The challenge of treating 2 epidemics at once

Experts concerned heroin users will turn to more dangerous fentanyl

Drug treatment experts have raised concerns a drop in the supply of illicit drugs to the UK triggered by the lockdown is leading to an increase in the number of users turning to more dangerous alternatives.

A reduction in global travel, increased border restrictions and a slowdown in movement within the UK has resulted in a drop in the supply of illicit drugs, including heroin and the designer drug spice.

The Guardian understands that border guards have noted a recent drop in seizures as traffic into the country subsides, while senior police sources have noted the dip in supply.

But experts have warned that fewer drugs on the streets is not as positive as it sounds, as users are already turning to high-strength alternatives such benzodiazepines, while there is a significant risk of heroin users substituting with fentanyl, a lethal drug 50 to 100 times stronger than heroin.

The number of drug-related deaths is at a record high, according to the most recent official estimates, driven by deaths linked to drug misuse.

The reduced supply is also leading to an increase in the price of some substances, including cannabis, and decreasing the purity of others as dealers cut them with different chemicals to increase bulk, experts have told the Guardian.

Coronavirus triggers UK shortage of illicit drugs

The governor of the U.S. state of Virginia has approved a law that removes all criminal penalties for simple cannabis possession.

This is not legalisation, but decriminalisation. The new law (HB972), which will take effect from July 1, means that possession of up to one ounce of cannabis will no longer be a criminal offence and can only be met with a civil penalty – a fine of up to $25 (£20). Until now, a first-time cannabis possession offence could be punished by up to 30 days’ imprisonment and a $500 (£400) fine. Possession of more than an ounce, or the sale of any amount, remain criminal offences that can garner several years imprisonment.

The criminalization of cannabis has had a significant impact on the population of Virginia, particularly in recent years. According to the Virginia State Police, there were almost 29,000 arrests relating to cannabis in 2019 – of which more than 50 per cent involved people under the age of 24.

Perhaps the most disproportionate impact of criminalization has been that imposed upon Virginia’s Black communities. Despite making up less than 20 per cent of the state population, Black people make up 45 per cent of first-offence cannabis possession arrests in Virginia between 2007 and 2016. For subsequent cannabis possession offences, that proportion rises to a staggering 53 per cent.

It’s a similar story to the manifestation of the drug war across the U.S. As the Drug Policy Alliance has found, Black people and other people of colour use and sell drugs at similar rates to white people, yet “they are more likely to be stopped, searched, arrested, convicted and harshly sentenced, [and] they suffer most from the repercussions of a lifelong criminal record”.

Indeed, the impact of a drug conviction, however minor, can be wide-reaching in its harms beyond incarceration, creating barriers to education, housing, and employment. This can lead to a cycle of poverty, impacting people’s children and families, spurring ripple effects that harm entire communities.

Virginia passes cannabis decriminalisation amid huge racial disparity in arrests

By Carrie Tait, Marcus Gee & Andrea Woo for The Globe and Mail

Physicians across the country are relaxing their prescribing practices around medical treatment for opioid addictions in a bid to bolster physical distancing by cutting down on urinary drug screens and increasing the amount of methadone they give patients to take at home without supervision.

Health care professionals specializing in drug addictions were already struggling to cope with an epidemic of overdoses that has claimed thousands of lives across Canada before the worldwide pandemic. Now, the novel coronavirus is upending years of medical tradition and adding another layer of risk.

Doctors, nurses and harm-reduction experts are concerned their clients will catch the virus and succumb to it, given the often shaky health of those who use drugs. Access to supervised consumption sites for illicit substances and detox centres is also contracting, putting people who use street drugs at greater risk of overdosing.

Health Canada last month relaxed prescribing rules for some controlled drugs, making it easier for doctors and pharmacists to give people access to opioids. The changes mean some patients in opioid agonist therapy (OAT) programs will not have to make as many trips to pharmacies and clinics. It also means some OAT patients will have more access to larger quantities of medicine like methadone that can be fatal if not taken properly.

Patients in OAT programs take controlled doses of drugs such as methadone and buprenorphine-naloxone, which is known as suboxone, to manage opioid-withdrawal symptoms and create stability in their lives. Patients, particularly those on methadone, often have to take their doses under supervision at pharmacies or clinics. Stable patients are, over time, permitted to take home a limited number of doses, known as carries, but even the most trusted generally return to the clinic or pharmacy once a week for a supervised dose.

Canada: Pandemic restrictions reshape opioid treatment as doctors sound alarm

“Marijuana is the drug for which most kids get penalized in school settings,” Sheila Vakharia, deputy director of the Department of Research and Academic Engagement at the Drug Policy Alliance (DPA), tells 

The War on Drugs disproportionately impacts Black and Brown youth in schools, like it disproportionately impacts their older relatives and neighborhoods overall. But young people may have more to lose than adults because drug criminalization often leads to school suspension and expulsion, even in states with more progressive cannabis reform.

As recreational legalization measures sweep the nation and CBD-infused products proliferate, young people are still negatively impacted by cannabis policing. This is also true in states that have legalized pot. According to 2018 policing data compiled by the state of Colorado, drug-related infractions made up approximately 5-6% of all student suspensions, but cannabis accounted for about 70% of suspensions or expulsions for drugs, and almost 80% of law enforcement referrals for drugs in the 2017-2018 school year.

Young people don't seem to be consuming cannabis more widely these days. According to a 2018 DPA report, “Preliminary data suggest that youth marijuana use rates have remained stable and have actually gone down in some cases, both nationally and in states that have legalized marijuana for adults.” Additionally, despite the presumption that cannabis use among minors would increase as states passed recreational measures, research has shown that has not been the case. In Washington, where adult retail marijuana sales were legalized in 2012, the state’s largest metropolitan county saw a decline in marijuana use among students in grades 6, 8, 10, and 12, according to 2019 research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

United States: Black and Brown teens are still more likely to be punished for smoking weed

By Rick Lines, Naomi Burke-Shyne & Giada Girelli / 

“In every situation, where a number of people are crowded together, whether in ships, hospitals, or prisons, unless the strictest attention be paid to cleanliness, and to a free ventilation or circulation of air, a fever soon or later breaks out amongst them, of a very contagious nature, and attended with very fatal effects”.So begins the account of Dr James Carmichael Smyth of an outbreak of jail distemper (typhus) in Winchester prison in England in 1780. Over the course of three and half months, 268 Spanish prisoners of war died, with Smyth himself surviving two separate bouts of the disease while caring for the sick men.

The rapid spread of contagion and death among prisoners was not a new phenomenon. The first documented outbreak of ‘gaol fever’ in England took place in Newgate and Ludgate Prison in 1414, resulting in the deaths of 64 prisoners and gaolers. Almost 50 recorded outbreaks of fever in British prisons predate the Winchester events described by Dr Smyth, resulting in the deaths of thousands.

Nearly 250 years later, the prisons of the world are struggling to address a new ‘gaol fever’ that threatens to dwarf the impacts of previous historic contagions—COVID-19. With physical distancing core to the COVID-19 response—an impossibility in most places of detention—the health risks of congested prisons have again come to the fore. Poor and overcrowded conditions of detention, coupled with a detainee population that often suffers from multiple heath vulnerabilities, have long made prisons susceptible to rapid spread of disease and death. The highly contagious nature of the COVID-19, its global spread, and the worrying levels of mortality associated with it, have therefore raised widespread concern.

The relationship between prison health and public health is well established. In many of the historic cases of gaol fever the contagion spread beyond the prison walls into surrounding towns and villages.In more recent years, transmission of both HIV and TB has been documented in prisons, raising wider public health concerns about the role of incarceration in sustaining those epidemics. For this reason, protecting people in detention from the spread of COVID-19 must form an integral element of the global response to the virus.