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Overview
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 The ‘11th International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harm’ took place from 9th – 13th April 2000 at the Hotel de France in St. Helier, Jersey (in the Channel Islands). The conference was organised by IHRA and HIT and, for the first time, was financially underwritten by a national government – the States of Jersey. The conference was also co-sponsored by UNAIDS and supported by the Centre for Research on Drugs and Health Behaviour.
The event attracted over 600 people from around 50 different countries – including delegates from North and South America, Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Australasia, and all over Europe. The overall conference theme was ‘Integrated Approaches to Diverse Challenges’.
On Sunday 9th April, the Opening Session was chaired by the Conference President Michael Wavell (the first politician to hold this title at an IHRA conference), and included speeches from representatives from the three major international organisations related to harm reduction – the World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, and Dr. Peter Piot – the Executive Director of UNAIDS. It was the first time that these key multilateral organisations had been represented in this way at an IHRA conference.
The conference programme was put together by the Programme Director – Professor Gerry Stimson – and a Programme Committee. There were four plenary sessions during the conference (each with translation in English, French and Russian) - ‘Harm Reduction: The Next Ten Years’, ‘Human Rights’, ‘Health and Drugs’, and ‘Globalisation and International Dimensions’.
The remainder of the conference programme consisted of symposia, roundtables, skills sharing and workshops and – for the first time at an IHRA conference – poster sessions. Overall, there were around 250 presenters over five days on a wide range of issues – including needle exchange, substitution treatment, prevalence and incidence research, drug consumption rooms, overdose, alcohol, club drugs, user groups, criminal justice systems, drug policy in the European Union, young people, the legal regulation of drugs, women and drugs, drugs and the internet, rapid assessments, and networks. There was also a keynote ‘Rolleston Oration’ from Professor Nick Crofts on ‘The Challenge of Hepatitis C: A Test for Harm Reduction’.
The St. Helier conference also hosted the ‘1st International Harm Reduction Congress on Women and Drugs’ – a one-day satellite event on Sunday 3rd March organised by the International Network on Women and Drugs – and a major side-meeting of harm reduction experts from the UK which formed the basis for the UK Harm Reduction Alliance. There was also an opening reception and conference party, and a special film presentation on music and marijuana (“75 Years of Reefer Music”).
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Presentations
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 Petra Meier – ‘Service Accessibility for Female Drug Users: Treatment Agencies and Needle Exchanges’ [PDF:50KB]
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IHRA Awards
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 The International Rolleston Award was awarded to Patrick O'Hare, the Executive Director of IHRA from 1996 (when the organisation was founded) to 2004 – when he became the IHRA Honorary President. The award was presented in recognition of Mr. O’Hare’s groundbreaking work in the harm reduction field since the mid-1980s as Director of the Mersey Drug Training and Information Centre in Liverpool – the project that eventually created the International Journal of Drug Policy and the IHRA conferences.
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Click here to view the history of the International Rolleston Award
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 The National Rolleston Award was awarded to Michael Wavell, a prominent Minister in the States of Jersey Government who was a long-term supporter of harm reduction and a key figure in the development of Jersey’s first Substance Misuse Strategy (covering both illicit and licit substances).
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Click here to view the history of the National Rolleston Award
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Photos
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Click images to view larger
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Links
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If you have any presentations, photos, links or reports from the 11th International Conference on the Reduction of Drug Related Harm (or any other IHRA conference) that you would like to feature on these archive pages, please contact Jamie Bridge.
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