Harm Reduction

On this Mother's Day, more than 100,000 women are behind bars in American prisons, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, and many of them are doing time for drug offenses. That's too many, said members of a new coalition, Moms United to End the War on Drugs, as they held events last week in the days running up to Mother's Day.

[image:1 align:left caption:true]"The war on drugs is really a war on families," said Mom's United's Gretchen Burns Bergman. "It is time to end the stigmatization and criminalization of people who use drugs and move from arrest and mass incarceration to therapeutic, health-oriented strategies. Moms were the driving force in repealing alcohol prohibition and now moms will play a similar role in ending the war on drugs."

Bergman, from San Diego, is the mother of two sons who have struggled with substance abuse and incarceration and is a founder of A New PATH (Parents for Addiction Treatment & Healing). A New PATH has joined forces with other groups, including Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP), the NORML Women's Alliance, Families to Amend California's Three Strikes, and Students for Sensible Drug Policy to form Moms United to agitate for an end to the drug war and a turn toward sensible, evidence-based drug policies.

The week leading up to Mother's Day was a week of action under the rubric of Cops and Moms Working Together to End Prohibition. The week saw events and press conferences in Atlanta, Boston, New York City, and Washington, DC, in the East and Los Angeles, San Diego, Oakland on the West Coast. 

"Mother's Day was derived out of an intensely political effort to organize women on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line against the Civil War," said Sabrina Fendrick, coordinator for the NORML Women's Alliance. "The reason mothers were made the vehicle was because they were the ones whose children were dying in that war. Women were also largely responsible for ending alcohol prohibition.  This is more than just a ‘greeting-card holiday,’ this is the beginning of an institutional change in our society. The government's war on drugs is unacceptable. For our children's sake, the concerned mothers of the world are being called on to demand the implementation of a rational, responsible, reality-based drug and marijuana policy."

Last Wednesday, at a San Diego press conference, the umbrella group unveiled the Moms United to End the War on Drugs Bill of Rights, a 12-point motherhood and drug reform manifesto which calls for "the right to nurture our offspring, and to advocate for their care and safety" and "the parental right to policies and practices that recognize addiction as a disease in need of treatment, rather than a willful behavior to be criminalized," as well as the right to have harm reduction and overdose prevention practices implemented, the right to be free from heavy-handed, constitution-threatening drug war policing, and the right to be free from drug war violence.

[image:2 align:right caption:true]"If we stop arresting and incarcerating drug users, think of the number of children who would have the chance to look upon their parents as positive role models instead of having parents who are absent because they are incarcerated," the group said. "We have a moral and ethical obligation to give these children a better chance in life by allowing parents to take care of their families. These parents should have the opportunity to become the productive members of society and role models to their children that they want to be and that their children need and deserve."

The Bill of Rights has been endorsed by a number of religious, reform, and civil rights groups, and individuals can sign onto it, too. To sign on, go to the online petition.

"We are building a movement to stop the stigmatization and criminalization of people who use drugs or are addicted to drugs," the group said. "We urgently call for health-oriented strategies and widespread drug policy reform in order to stop the irresponsible waste of dollars and resources, and the devastating loss of lives and liberty."

It's not just Moms United who is using Mother's Day to strike a blow for drug reform. In Colorado, where Amendment 64 to legalize and regulate marijuana is on the ballot, the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol is running a television ad featuring a young woman writing an email to her mother in which she explains that she has found her marijuana use to be safer and healthier than the drinking she did in college.

The ad is aimed at a demographic that is both critical to and difficult for the campaign: women in their 30s and 40s, many of whom are mothers. The ad appeared Friday and again on Mother's Day.

“Our goal with the ad is to start a conversation — and encourage others to start their own conversations — about marijuana,” Betty Aldworth, the advocacy director for the campaign.

And it's not just the United States, either. In mother-honoring Mexico, which marked Mother's Day on Thursday, hundreds of women and other family members traveled to Mexico City on the National March for Dignity to demand that the government locate their loved ones gone missing in the drug wars, according to the Frontera NorteSur news service.

"They took them alive, and alive we want them," the marchers chanted.

While the drug wars in Mexico have claimed at least 50,000 lives, including 49 people whose dismembered bodies were found on a highway outside Monterrey Sunday morning, thousands more have gone missing, either simply vanished or last seen in the hands of armed, uniformed men.

The Mexican government doesn't report on how many have gone missing in its campaign against the cartels, but the Inter-American Human Rights Commission counts more than 5,000 missing persons complaints filed with police—and this in a country where many people so mistrust the police they don't bother to file official reports.

"For some it has been years, for others months or days, of walking alone, of clamoring in the desert of the hallways of indolent and irresponsible authorities, many of them directly responsible for disappearances or complicit with those who took our loved ones away," the mothers’ group said.

On Mother's Day, many mothers in Mexico have "nothing to celebrate," said Norma Ledezma, co-founder of Justice for Our Daughters in Chihuahua City. "As families, we want to take this occasion to tell society not to forget that in Mexico there is home with a plate and a seat empty."

"We have walked alone in the middle of stares and stigmatizing commentaries, and we have been treated like lepers,  marginalized and condemned to the worst pain a human being could live: not knowing the whereabouts of our sons and daughters," the new mother’s movement declared. "But now we are not alone. We have found hundreds of mothers and we unite our clamor and our love to recover our loved ones and bring them home."

On Mother's Day, the agony of the drug war transcends borders. And the call from mothers for a more sane and human alternative continues to grow, from Chihuahua to Chicago and from Oaxaca to Washington.

Abbotsford News, 03 May 2012 - Council Will Revisit Harm Reduction Bylaw Abbotsford will re-examine its harm reduction policy. Mayor Bruce Banman said he plans to review the bylaw, which bans needle exchange facilities and other forms of harm reduction from operating in the city - despite the fact he hasn't seen a new report issued by Fraser Health.

Abbotsford Times, 01 May 2012 - Fraser Health Sticks It to Safe Injection Sites, Suggests Needle Exchange Is the Best Option for Abbotsford Fraser Health Authority released a proposed harm reduction plan centered around needle distribution for the City of Abbotsford on Monday.

The Oshawa Express, 01 May 2012 - Beth Whalen sees many walks of life come through the doors of the John Howard Society of Durham Region. Each person has their own story to tell. Lately, the tales she's heard are showing more people are turning to heroin and fentanyl use in part because the popular painkiller OxyContin is going off the market, being replaced with a more difficult drug to tamper with in OxyNEO.

Globe and Mail, 27 Apr 2012 - As debate about the failure of the drug war gains momentum, nobody is expecting a sudden ceasefire between cartels and police. It is far too complex and diffuse a problem. Instead, small battles will be won city by city, neighbourhood by neighbourhood. One striking success is Vancouver's InSite program, North America's only supervised-injection site. Prime Minister Stephen Harper tried to close the clinic, and would have if the Supreme Court of Canada hadn't intervened. The court approved the clinic because of the specific conditions that gave rise to it, including the concentration of drug addicts in the impoverished Downtown Eastside neighbourhood and the high rates of disease and overdose.

Globe and Mail, 26 Apr 2012 - Sir Richard Branson, the Virgin Group Founder, and a commissioner with the Global Commission on Drug Policy, answers Globe and Mail readers' questions about why the war on drugs has failed. The commission released a ground-breaking report last June which found that prohibition serves only to empower violent criminal cartels and does not deter drug users in any way.

Globe and Mail, 26 Apr 2012 - The global war on drugs is based on false assumptions and antiquated laws that do not reflect contemporary research about drug use, production and markets. It is time to cast aside dogma, and transform global drug strategy with policies based on evidence, not ideology. At the recent Summit of the Americas, Latin America's leaders pressed Prime Minister Stephen Harper and U.S. President Barack Obama to study alternatives to the failed war on drugs; even Mr. Harper, architect of mandatory minimums for minor drug offences at home, acknowledged the current approach isn't working. The 31 hemispheric leaders agreed to appoint a panel to study reform of global drug policies.

Goldstream Gazette, 25 Apr 2012 - Agency Discreetly Distributing Free Needles, Crack Piopes An organization that distributes free crack pipes, syringes or condoms for drug users is expanding its harm-reduction operations on the West Shore.

Metro, 24 Apr 2012 - One of the world's most respected authorities on humanitarian crises has commended local policy makers, health and law experts for challenging the war on drugs. Louise Arbour, former U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights and chief prosecutor for two international criminal tribunals, made the comments Monday at a Vancouver Board of Trade luncheon at the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel.

Bancroft This Week, 24 Apr 2012 - It's been 90 days since 20 RCMP and OPP officers raided the home and medical clinic of Dr. Rob Kamermans in Coe Hill. The warrant said the doctor was possessing and trafficking drugs. Found at his office on the morning of Jan. 26, Kamermans was cuffed and taken away by the OPP. He says an officer made him pose for a picture in handcuffs outside his clinic. When he asked why he had to be cuffed, he was told it was for the protection of the police.

Abbotsford Times, 24 Apr 2012 - Numbers in an upcoming Fraser Health report for the City of Abbotsford around injection drug use show relatively high rates of overdose hospitalizations, deaths and hepatitis C rates within the community. And those rates may be tied to the city's lack of harm reduction services, says a Fraser Health expert.

Abbotsford News, 24 Apr 2012 - BEGINNING THE DIALOGUE WITH YOUTH An Abbotsford Police youth officer, a physician with some expertise in addictions, and a drug and alcohol counsellor were at Robert Bateman secondary on Thursday evening to speak with parents about drugs.

Toronto Star, 21 Apr 2012 - OTTAWA - Thomas Mulcair is clearing the air on pot, clarifying that he doesn't believe anyone should go to jail for possessing a couple of joints. The freshly minted NDP leader created confusion about his party's position recently when he said decriminalization of marijuana would be a mistake.

The Record, 20 Apr 2012 - But Report's Author Says Stats Are on Par With Other Cities A Fraser Health Authority report on injection drug use and harm reduction is showing relatively high rates of hepatitis C, illicit drug overdoses and deaths for New Westminster, although the report's author says the Royal City is on par with surrounding municipalities.

Globe and Mail, 20 Apr 2012 - Tom Mulcair is clearing the air on pot, clarifying that he doesn't believe anyone should go to jail for possessing a couple of joints. The freshly minted NDP leader created confusion about his party's position recently when he said decriminalization of marijuana would be a mistake.

The Copenhagen Post, 19 Apr 2012 - the Location of Copenhagen's First Permanent Injection Room Has Been Found in the City's Vesterbro District After years of political wrangling, Copenhagen City Council decided yesterday that a community centre on Istedgade in Vesterbro will be the site of Copenhagen's first permanent injection room.

Globe and Mail, 17 Apr 2012 - This weekend's Summit of the Americas did not produce a joint communique charting the future of the hemisphere, but the 31 leaders agreed on one thing: The U.S.-led war on drugs has been a dismal failure. The summit pledged to create a panel of experts through the Organization of American States to consider drug policy reforms, and new approaches to stem the violence and power of the drug cartels.

Kenora Daily Miner And News, 16 Apr 2012 - Kenora's needle exchange increased 28 per cent last year - and that's normal. The Northwestern Health Unit program mostly based out of the Morning Star detox centre handed out 69,340 needles in 2011, up from 49,720 in 2010.

Herald News, 14 Apr 2012 - You'd never have thought heroin addiction would come to torment teens in the suburbs. We all know it's an inner-city scourge, a street drug. That comforting but errant presumption has gotten in the way of facing the problem. As our stories this past week revealed, heroin use in South Cook and Will counties has become an epidemic - one that has found teenagers more susceptible than adults, allowing it to stay hidden longer than most plagues.

Toronto Sun, 13 Apr 2012 - Toronto already has methadone and needle exchange programs for drug addicts. We don't need three new sites where addicts could inject illegal drugs, as recommended by the Toronto and Ottawa Supervised Consumption Assessment study prepared by St. Michael's Hospital and the University of Toronto.