Bridging the Gaps 2 - PWUD project South Africa

The main drugs of choice in South Africa are alcohol, cannabis, heroin and methamphetamine. Methamphetamine is locally known as tik. Most heroin is smoked mixed with cannabis, a popular mix called whoonga, cocktail or nyope. Heroin injection, however, has been increasing in recent years. Harm reduction programmes were introduced in South Africa only in 2014, focusing on PWID. South Africa counts with a progressive legal framework around drug policies, supporting a harm reduction approach. Nevertheless, and despite being considered a middle-income country, government funding for harm reduction is still very limited. Moral issues around drugs play an important role in this disparity. With the help of Bridging the Gaps Program, in 2 years’ time 3 Needles and Syringe Programmes (NSP) for People who Inject Drugs (PWID) were built and developed in 3 key-cities (Cape Town, Durban and Pretoria). Some of the activities offered by the programmes are HIV prevention and testing, needle and syringe distribution, drop in centres, and referral to other services. On the advocacy side, Mainline supports the development of two recently born regional drug users’ networks, documentation of human rights violation towards PWUD, media articles on human rights for PWUD and national events to debate drug policies. One excellent example of such an event is the RUN 2016 – SA Drug Policy Week – link: http://www.sadrugpolicyweek.com/. As a result of advocacy efforts, 3 new Opiate Substitution Treatment (OST) pilots will start in 2017 in Durban (Kwazulu Natal), Cape Town (Western Cape) and Pretoria (Gauteng). To support this, Mainline recently delivered a training on OST to South African outreach workers, together with our local partners. Training focused on understanding the medical aspects of OST and possibilities of psychosocial assistance for OST clients. Read more about the training here: http://english.mainline.nl/posts/show/10139/training-on-opiate-substitution-treatment-in-south-africa