That means the dozens of agencies the city hires to provide drug and alcohol treatment must have harm- reduction programs and policies in place. The city is teaching jail inmates how to perform CPR on their friends who may be overdosing on drugs. A media campaign aimed at teaching addicts how to reduce deaths from heroin overdose is in the works. Harm reduction opens the doors to honesty and allows providers to move addicts one positive step at a time toward better health. Proponents of harm reduction focus on the ill effects of addiction, from homelessness to the spread of AIDS and hepatitis and overdose deaths.
Approaches vary widely.
Among other things, conference speakers talked about bringing medical care to the streets and using acupuncture and marijuana to help addicts reduce their craving for harder drugs. Many harm-reduction strategies, including safe injection rooms and prescription heroin, are already used in the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany. And following the uproar in Sydney over the injection room, the Australian government has promised to open an official site, to debut next month. And she acknowledged losing funding and some speakers by including it. Yet the concept of harm reduction has been around for years.