For example, when I'm working with a crack user, one of the problems is that they don't eat enough. It turns out they might only have one full meal a week. It's a 'leap into health' thing. But very few people can leap. It is not harm reduction versus abstinence.
Harm reduction can include abstinence.
Clear participated in ACT UP's illegal underground needle exchanges in 1990. Eventually, he ran the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center, which included a needle exchange that New York State legalized in 1992. It's how to minimize harm for the individual and the community. The end point of drug treatment is whether a person has stopped using drugs. We don't do that.