At the national harm reduction conference in Budapest,  presenters from Greece, Romania and Hungary reported that there are similar problems and challenges in relation to injecting drug use in Southern-Central Europe, but there are huge differences between government responses. Lack of political leadership is leading to growing HIV and hepatitis C infections among drug users all over the region.

Check out our new infographic on Romania, where the poor health services provided for injecting drug users lead to increased shared needle use driven by new psychoactive substances. All of this has caused a surge in new HIV cases, and the revival of tuberculosis among people who use drugs.

The recent closure of the largest needle and syringe exchange program in Budapest raised a lot of concerns. Read how the leader of a similar service, ArtEra, sees the changing landscape for injecting drug users in the Hungarian capital.

Do the recent structural changes to Portuguese harm reduction services threaten the stability and integrity of the country’s system? Our local EDPI partner, APDES, guides readers through this issue.

The president of Turkey declared a war on drugs – but is it really what his country needs? Read our report from Istanbul! 

New Zealand decided to decriminalise sex work in 2003. Please watch our film and learn how sex workers see the impact of this law on their daily lives!

Recreational drug use is  common in party settings among Serbian youth– a recent large scale study concluded  – bringing further evidence for the need to make party harm reduction services widely available across the country.

Our video features an interesting presentation by Pye Jakobsson about the origins of the so called Swedish model, the policy criminalising the clients of sex workers.

Harm Reduction International, the International HIV/AIDS Alliance and the International Drug Policy Consortium have launched a ground-breaking study highlighting the funding crisis for harm reduction. Drugreporter filmed the presentation of the new report at the AIDS conference in Melbourne. Watch the very informative and important speeches of Maria Phelan, David Wilson and Tanya Deshko!

Read a report about our campaign for opening supervised injection sites in Budapest – and watch our campaign movie with English subtitles!