Collaborating to make harm reduction accessible

Throughout Asia, AHRN provides advocacy materials and technical support to many organisations, including UN agencies that offer effective programmes targeting HIV transmission among injecting drug users. Despite overwhelming evidence that people who use drugs can effectively be treated as part of a public health response, as opposed to being stigmatised and punished under the judicial imperatives, public health programmes have so far proven no match for morally driven criminalisation.

Due to the ongoing and widespread misconceptions about the nature and results of a pragmatic public health approach to help people who inject drugs, what is most urgently needed is compelling and accessible advocacy materials that document the benefits and successes of HIV prevention and harm reduction models in the region.

Video Production and Multi-Media Services
In 2003 the AHRN established a media department. After investing in digital video recording and production equipment, expert staff set about producing films that document best practice harm reduction projects and study visits. AHRN can now also produce tailor-made multi-media presentations in VCD and/or DVD format.

The main advantage of making audio visual materials within a harm reduction organisation is that it can draw upon in-house technical expertise and create professional productions that cost significantly less than those commissioned through outside production companies.

Media Production: Video documentation of successful projects
The most accessible and effective medium for revealing the challenges, as well as demonstrating practical solutions, is video production. It has several advantages over purely written documentation and represents the next great leap forward in advocacy and information dissemination.

By using video to document successful programmes across Asia, and by systematically archiving and re-using video footage, the AHRN is producing a series of advocacy films - 'Project Profiles' - demonstrating the benefits of HIV prevention and harm reduction programmes and policies.

Multi Media Advocacy and Training Services
In accordance with AHRN's advocacy and information sharing mandates, it can now offer a range of services that serve the cause of raising the profile of harm reduction issues, escalating programme implementation, technical support and provision of training in film production. For more information and to request an AHRN Media Workshop, downlaod and complete the Media Capacity Building Request Form.

Media Production:
AHRN is now offering its services to organisations working in the field of harm reduction and HIV prevention.

Advantages of audio-visual production:
Regional networking - By seeing staff from various organisations and listening to their first hand reports of their work, harm reduction specialists can become familiar with one another before conferences and workshops, leaving more face-to-face time for in-depth discussions and interactions instead of lengthy introductions and project descriptions.

Access to Best Practices - By witnessing and listening to first hand accounts of successful programmes, local staff will gain access to methodological resources faster and more fully than through paper reports.

Powerful local, regional, and international advocacy tools - Well produced, professional films offer a degree of impact and accessibility unavailable to textual and print media. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a twenty minute film speaks volumes.

An aid to fundraising - Organisations could submit a film/multi-media presentation together with their grant proposal or annual report.

AHRN video productions:

When Poverty Meets Drugs and HIV/AIDS in New Delhi
In New Delhi, India, members of injecting drug use and transgender communities are especially vulnerable. This short film explores and demonstrates the inter-relationships drug use and HIV /AIDS as poverty-driven phenomenon leading to greater risk behaviors and situations.

Scaling Up HIV Prevention and Harm Reduction in Iran
This film looks at the general situation of drug use in Iran, meets people affected by drug dependence and HIV/AIDS, and hears from officials about the kind of services that are presently being offered to drug users and their families. The film captures the exemplary leasdership in policy change ratified in 2005 by the Iranian government.

Drug User's Perspective (World Bank sponsored)
This short film gives a voice to drug users and recovering drug users in five Asian countries. They talk about how they first started using drugs and their lack of foreknowledge in avoiding the consequent health hazards. This film was produced for the 7th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP) to ensure that drug users could voice their needs wihtout fear of stigma or discrimination. Available in English with Thai subtitles.

Women, Girls, HIV/AIDS: Focus Asia (UNAIDS sponsored)
Globally, young women and girls are more susceptible to HIV than men and boys, with studies showing they can be two and a half times more likely to be living with HIV as their male counterparts. Asia is now at a critical stage in the response to curb the spread of HIV as infections top eight million, with number rising sharply among women who have little or no access to prevention services.

Women, Girls, HIV/AIDS: Focus Thailand
Globally, young women and girls are more susceptible to HIV than men and boys. Thailand is no exception. Although acknowledged as the most successful country in Asia when it came to preventing HIV transmission, the prevalence of HIV is still around two percent in a population of 65 million, and recent evidence points to transmission between spouses as well as injecting drug users to be a growing cause of new infections.

Window of Opportunity
This multi-media film gives an overview of AHRN's activities, an introduction to the principles of harm reduction and an overview of the current HIV /AIDS situation and what is needed to effectively address it in Asia. Available in English with Thai subtitles.

Smile
Project Smile is an outreach project run by the NGO Nai Zindagi for street children using drugs in Lahore, Pakistan.

Friends
'Mith Samlanh' means 'Friends' in the Cambodian language of Khmer. This film gives an overview of the comprehensive services being provided to street children in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh.

Pakistan Exposure Tour 2003
A Myanmar delegation witnesses harm reduction projects being run by the NGO, Nai Zindagi in Lahore and Islamabad, Pakistan.

Indonesian Policy Orientation Visit to The Netherlands
An Indonesian delegation of decision makers learns about Dutch drug policy and harm reduction as an integrated part of public health policy.

To learn more about the projects and programmes run out of the AHRN Media department, please download and consult that AHRN Capacity Statement and contact Mr. Ekkachit Krekkiawan.

Press Releases

Harm Reduction Related Policy Materials:
Year 2003

Year 2002

Year 2001

Year 2000

Regional Advocacy Workshop on Prevention of Drug Use and HIV/AIDS in Asia and the Pacific at the United Nations Convention Centre, Bangkok, 11-13 October, 2000.

Year 1999