Naloxone made available at home

Addiction Economy Thought for Today - a positive response to the negative Moral Model of Addiction - where people are stigmatised and shamed for their use of addictive products to the point it harms them - is the 'harm reduction' movement.

"Harm reduction refers to policies, programmes and practices that aim to minimise the negative health, social and legal impacts associated with drug use, drug policies and drug laws.

Harm reduction is grounded in justice and human rights. It focuses on positive change and on working with people without judgement, coercion, discrimination, or requiring that people stop using drugs as a precondition of support."

There are lots of orgs in this area, but this helpful description came from Harm Reduction International.

https://hri.global/

We haven't even scratched the surface of this yet, but an example here of the types of policies which it makes happen is here. "A life-saving anti-overdose drug is to be made available for use at home in England without a prescription. The medicine, known as naloxone, will be given to addicts at risk of an opioid overdose for use in an emergency. Police officers, social workers and probation officers are among those who will be allowed to distribute the medicine.

As an aside, advocates of giving vapes to smokers (which we agree with, with caveats) campaign under the Harm Reduction 'banner' and the more extreme castigate those who want to restrict the free marketing of vapes because that may undermine the inclination of smokers to swap. Which it might. But it is also more likely to restrict the widespread use of vapes as a recreational product in the wider population. Which they are less worried about.

Vapes and the harm reduction arguments are an interesting example of the trade offs which have to be made and the difficulties navigating the competing needs in the area of addictive products and the passionate and heartfelt views of the different campaigners.

https://lnkd.in/gBmW2a4v