Opposition to harm reduction - December 2003

I was disappointed to have read the report on the recently concluded workshop of ASEAN anti-drug non-governmental organisations (“NGOs reject legalising of drugs for personal use” – NST 6/12) stating their outright rejection of the “harm reduction” approach in curbing addiction and substance abuse in this region. Having decided that “harm reduction” is a “dangerous development”, they have instead decided to continue the current approach of prosecution and criminalisation.

Despite more than three decades of an “all-out war against drugs”, immense public support and tens of millions of ringgit spent every year, this singular approach has very little positive to show as there are record high numbers of new drug users and an alarming rate of relapsed individuals who have gone through the Pusat Serenti rehabilitation process. Even more alarming, is the rate of HIV infection amongst drug users resulting in this group of society comprising 42,000 individuals or 75 percent of reported HIV cases in the country (MOH June 2002).

The harm reduction based approach, of which decriminalising of certain substances is only one option, also includes the exchange of needles to prevent the spread of infectious diseases through blood, primarily HIV. By stating their opposition to harm reduction, the anti-drug NGOs have decided to prevent a way to save the lives of drug users from HIV infection.
Evidence from other programmes conducted in Australia, Holland, Thailand, Russian Federation and many other countries facing the AIDS epidemic indicate that the harm reduction approach is more effective in decreasing the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS through needle exchange programmes.

In addition to that in June 2001, at the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on HIV/AIDS, Malaysia made a commitment through the Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS, to provide HIV prevention programmes that included harm-reduction (Article 52, Declaration of Commitment on HIV/AIDS, June 2001) to prevent infection and reduce the vulnerability of the drug user community.

It is instead a dangerous development that decisions to effectively curb and prevent drug use appear to not be based on evidence and that the solution is to simply continue what doesn’t work. All-out war on drugs must be complemented with harm reduction programmes to rehabilitate, provide care and support, as well prevent HIV infection.