ImaginaryDay2
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So as not to hijack another thread, I thought I'd share some information about the "harm reduction" model. The attached is from the British Columbia Harm Reduction Community Guide - sort of a 'layman's' guide to B.C. policy regarding substance misuse treatment.
Harm Reduction Guide said:The International Harm Reduction Association (2002) describes harm reduction as:
Policies and programs which attempt primarily to reduce the adverse health, social and economic consequences of mood altering substances to individual drug users, their families and communities, without requiring decrease in drug use.
Harm reduction is a pragmatic response that focuses on keeping people safe and minimizing death, disease and injury associated with higher risk behaviour, while recognizing that the behaviour may continue despite the risks. At the conceptual level, harm reduction maintains a value neutral and humanistic view of drug use and the drug user. It focuses on the harms from drug use rather than on the use itself. It does not insist on or object to abstinence and acknowledges the active role of the drug user in harm reduction programs.
At the practical level, the aim of harm reduction is to reduce the more immediate harmful consequences of drug use through pragmatic, realistic and low threshold programs. Examples of the more widely known harm reduction strategies are needle exchange programs, methadone maintenance treatment, outreach and education programs for high risk populations, law enforcement cooperation, medical prescription of heroin and other drugs, and supervised consumption facilities. (p. 4, emphasis in original)
http://www.health.gov.bc.ca/library/publications/year/2005/hrcommunityguide.pdf