Integrated Harm Reduction Programme

© Corrie Wingate for Frontline AIDS

Our harm reduction programme exists because we support, rather than punish, people who use drugs.

The risk of acquiring HIV for people who inject drugs is 35 times higher than people who do not inject drugs. Outside of sub-Saharan Africa, injecting drug use accounts for 20% of new HIV infections.

We are working to change this. The Integrated Harm Reduction Programme supports our partners to explore and implement community-led and person-centred, harm reduction services in areas where they are not yet available.

Together with other harm reduction programmes implemented by our partners, we form the largest community-led harm reduction programme in the world. Working together with national governments, The Global Fund and other donors, and programmes such as the Partnership to Inspire, Transform and Connect the HIV response (PITCH), gives us the broadest of experiences and global learning opportunities.

The Integrated Harm Reduction Programme is a follow on from our Community Action on Harm Reduction programme, which ended in 2015.

OUR RESULTS

  • Thanks to a successful pilot by our partner AIDS Care China, the Chinese government has adopted the take-home methadone model, disseminating it across the country.
  • The government structure of harm reduction services delivery in Myanmar and India now includes peer mentors from the community of people who use drugs.
  • In Senegal, harm reduction services for people who use drugs now reach new locations much quicker than before.
  • Nigeria is about to start the first needle exchange pilot project in its history.
  • A learning and exchange visit from three East African countries to China took place in 2018 to learn how to implement community-based harm reduction programmes, particularly around methadone distribution.

Will you help us end aids?

I would like to make a donation of:

Please enter the amount you would like to donate, ie: '10.00'