Last month, we announced the 2016 Annual General Meeting for the National Needle Exchange Forum (NNEF) to all our members. Unfortunately, it has not been possible to organise a full-day meeting this year. But the AGM – which will be held virtually via teleconference – is at least an opportunity to hear about, and participate in, some of the work of the Forum. The AGM will be held at 7pm on Monday 12th December.
Supervised drug consumption facilities, where illicit drugs can be used under the supervision of trained staff, have been operating in Europe for the last three decades.
These facilities primarily aim to reduce the acute risks of disease transmission through unhygienic injecting, prevent drug-related overdose deaths and connect high-risk drug users with drug dependence treatment and other health and social services.
This resource is intended for harm reduction service providers with limited experience of working with children and young people who inject drugs. It sets out a process that you can go through quickly, with little cost, to prepare for work with children and young people who are under 18.
This tool is a product of a partnership between Harm Reduction International (HRI), Youth Rise, International HIV/AIDS Alliance and Save the Children and was developed in response to HRI research on injecting drug use among under 18s globally that highlighted gaps in the response for this group.
The National Needle Exchange Forum (NNEF) held its annual meeting on September 25th in Birmingham at the Tally-Ho conference centre. The meeting brings together members of the NNEF to present the latest news and updates on harm reduction for needle exchange workers, harm reduction advocates and service users.
There were presentations on the latest developments on Naloxone, updates from Public Health England as well as updates on the work of the NNEF over the past year. Alongside some of the presentations there were Overdose and Naloxone Training sessions delivered by NNEF Deputy Chair Philippe Bonnet and Kevin Jaffary.
Kirstie Douse from Release gave an update on the legal situation with naloxone that comes into effect on October 1st 2015.
Nigel Brunsdon from HIT and Injecting Advice gave some practical advice on what services can do to be ready to deliver a take home naloxone service.
Charlottow O’Halloran from PHE spoke about the extent of overdoses and naloxone uptake among injectors.
Rob Wolstenholme from PHE gave us an update on the work they have been doing.
Viv Hope from PHE spoke about the use of mephedrone among injectors.
Katelyn Cullen from PHE talked about the latest figures on neck injecting in England.
Chris Emmerson spoke about the differences between the risk behaviours of those who only use pharmacy NSP and those who use specialist services.
Jamie Bridge and Matt Johnstone spoke about the work of the last year for the NNEF, including results of a Freedom of Information request to map the number of NSPs in England and the launch of the NNEF Secret Shopper Project.
Joseph Kean from Nine Zero Five presented about the current patterns of steroid use in the UK.
Sara McGrail gave the closing keynote, speaking passionately about drug policy in the UK and how it is reflected in the rise in drug related deaths (which are at their highest since records began). She finished up by encouraging all drugs workers to make sure they’re in a union.
There where also presentations which didn’t include powerpoints from David Ryan-Mills (Home Office) speaking about the plans to evaluate provision of foil in UK needle programmes, and from Jim Conneely (HepC Trust) talking about developments in HepC treatment.
Preventing the transmission of blood-borne viruses (BBV) such as HIV, hepatitis B and hepatitis C among people who inject drugs can have wide-reaching benefits: reducing health harms to individuals and subsequent costs to society.
This briefing helps local authorities and drug treatment and healthcare services to review their BBV prevention and treatment interventions for people who inject drugs. The content is drawn from published evidence, authoritative guidance, and feedback from drug treatment services.
2015 Annual General Meeting held in Birmingham on 25th September following the NNEF All Day Meeting.
The uk government has released the details of the changes being made in UK law to ease distribution of naloxone to people who are at risk of opiate overdose (changes will be happening Oct 2015).
As well as the amendment they have released supporting documents, a ‘final impact assessment’ and an ‘explanatory memorandum’. We are hoping to have more details soon on exactly how these will impact services.
After years of advocacy, and months of consultation and discussion, legislation has finally been laid before Parliament this month to expand access to naloxone. Although ambiguously worded – as these things often are – it seems to indicate that, from October 1st, drug services will be able to supply and stock naloxone without the need for individual or group prescriptions.
As you may have seen in the media recently, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has launched new guidelines on medical injections and a global campaign to switch all medical and vaccination injections to syringes that cannot be used more than once. These “safety-engineered syringes” may, for example, include a weak spot in the plunger that causes it to break if the user attempts to pull back on the plunger after the injection. Others have a metal clip that blocks the plunger so it cannot be moved back, while in others the needle retracts into the syringe barrel at the end of the injection.
As NNEF members may already know we are part of the Naloxone Action Group (NAG). NAG is made up of a number of organisations who have come together to press for wider availability of naloxone in England. Today the group has sent out a press release encouraging support of an Early Day Motion and asking people to contact their MPs to ask them to be involved.