British Doctors Propose Anti-Drug Program to Russia

Britain's Family Health, a non-governmental organization, has proposed a drug harm-reduction program to Russian health officials. Jeffrey Monahan, the group's international project manager, told a news conference today that the program, currently in use in Britain, distributes free syringes and one drug dose to addicts along with contraceptives, pamphlets explaining the harm of drugs, and advice about where to get an HIV test. Boris Tselinsky, a senior official of the Russian State Committee for Control of Drugs and Psychotropic Agents, said national legislation bans the use of drugs for non-medical purposes. Furthermore, Tselinsky said, experimental distribution of syringes to intravenous drug users in the Sverdlovsk region yielded no results. More than 70 percent of the 46,500 new HIV infections recorded in 2002 in Russia were contracted through drug injections.

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