Approaches to rights, gender and social inclusion in care services and proposals for territorialisation in highly vulnerable communities.
Problem drug use affects public health, but also social cohesion, as it affects, in some cases, the population in contexts of vulnerability and social exclusion, thus reinforcing inequalities.
From an epidemiological perspective, the majority of people affected by drug use are men, but women tend to suffer more and greater impacts. Poverty and marginalisation feed the cycle of negative consequences for individuals and communities, as drug use can lead to a considerable deterioration of living conditions, but also generate associated processes of stigmatisation and social exclusion. These phenomena represent barriers to access prevention services, comprehensive care and harm reduction for women or the LGTBQI+ population, among other vulnerable groups.
The COPOLAD III programme supports countries in the improvement of prevention and care systems for problematic drug use, from a comprehensive perspective. This involves strengthening approaches, processes and methodologies that take into account gender, rights and social inclusion as a decisive factor.
Additionally, this third phase of the programme promotes processes of territorialisation of policies, programmes and services in communities of high social vulnerability, which allow for effective and contextualised responses. This territorial and community-based approach, through specific projects, also promotes learning and lessons learned that can be “scaled up” to the national level.
This is done through the adaptation of materials developed by the European Drugs Agency, in relation to prevention, new substances, specific consumption with public response frameworks, cannabis and gender. Furthermore, it includes the elaboration of several publications and trainings on topics such as social inclusion, gender and accompaniment in national policies related to territorialisation, gender, harm reduction and innovation processes in public drug policies.
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