ID: 443

Type of submission: Oral

Conference track: Advocacy

Topics: Funding and Donors for Harm Reduction; Harm Reduction Advocacy and Activism

Presenting author: Olga Szubert

Presenting author biography:

Olga joined HRI in 2015 as Campaigns Manager. Prior to working at HRI, Olga worked at Stonewall as International Policy Officer and at the International HIV/AIDS Alliance as Policy and Campaigns Officer. She holds two MA’s in International Relations from Sussex University and Adam Mickiewicz University in Poland.

10 by 20: a global campaign to redirect resources from drug control to harm reduction

Olga Szubert

Issue:
International funding for harm reduction amounts to only $160 million. By contrast, each year governments spend $100 billion on drug control. In 2015 HRI launched 10 by 20, a global campaign to redirect 10% of resources currently spent on drug control to harm reduction by 2020.

Project:
With funding support from OSF, HRI convened a harm reduction working group as part of wider civil society preparations for the 2016 UNGASS on Drugs. A call for a new focus on harm reduction at the UNGASS – a harm reduction decade - emerged, alongside a longer term goal of 10% by 2020. In 2015 HRI then developed the 10 by 20 messaging further, and produced a campaign brand and materials to launch at CND in March 2015. In March 2016, HRI launched a report: ‘The Case for Harm Reduction Decade’. As detailed in the modelling projections in the report, a shift of as little as 2.5% of this money away from current drug control spending into harm reduction programmes has the potential to achieve a 78% reduction in new HIV infections among people who inject drugs by 2030, alongside a 65% drop in HIV-related deaths. In September 2016, HRI developed a four year long 10 by 20 strategy that aims on securing a redirection of $2.5 billion away from drug control and into harm reduction programmes by 2020.

Projected outcomes:
1. A global network of champion countries works together to increase political support for harm reduction and secures high level commitments to fund it.
2. By working together civil society partners and governments secure increased UN leadership on harm reduction and greater commitment to tackling the harm reduction funding crisis.
3. National governments adopt a 10 by 20 model in their national and international funding by 2020.