Category: General News

Global Health and Drug Policy Course

Posted on by Milutin

The Graduate Institute of the Global Health Centre in Geneva hosts the Global Health and Drug Policy Executive Course from 11 to 13 October 2021. The Course participants are about to benefit from the course:

  • Gain insight into the key concepts and current issues related to the international drug control regime and its intersection with public health and human rights
  • Identify the different stakeholders of the current drug policy debate and international processes
  • Prioritize public health based approaches to drug policy at national level.

They will enhance their skills on

  • Critical thinking – Strengthen stakeholders mapping skills for better analysis of the different roles of Geneva and Vienna- based agencies in international processes
  • Introduction to negotiating skills – Negotiate and influence the design and the implementation of drugs policies nationally and internationally

This year’s hybrid course is highly participatory, drawing on the national and international experiences of participants through a multi-disciplinary learning process. It includes lectures by internationally-renowned experts and negotiators, case studies, and working groups. A negotiation simulation exercise will complement the learning experience.

 

DPNSEE presented at the CSFD – HDG meeting

Posted on by Milutin

The new Civil Society Forum on Drugs 2021 – 2023 (CSFD) held meeting with the Horizontal Drug Group on 7 October 2021.

The Horizontal Working Party on Drugs (HDG) is a coordination body responsible for leading and managing the European Union Council’s work on drugs. This group, including national representatives of each EU country, meets on a monthly basis and prepares all relevant legislation and political documents adopted by the Council, such as the EU drugs strategies and action plans. In addition, the members of the group, under the leadership of the presidency, elaborate EU statements on drug-related aspects to be presented at international fora, such as the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND). Currently, HDG is chaired by Slovenia, which holds EU Presidency in the second half of 2021.

Topic of the meeting included Implementation of the EU Drugs Strategy and Action Plan 2021-2025, role of the CSFD and Drug-related deaths and how to best prevent them.

On request of the Slovenian EU Presidency, the DPNSEE Executive Director Milutin Milošević presented the Network, including presentation of the situation with services for people who use drugs and drug strategies in the region.

First meeting of the new CSFD

Posted on by Milutin

The new Civil Society Forum on Drugs (CSFD) held its first meeting on 6 October2021. This was the first meeting of this important EU expert group where DPNSEE participated.

CSFD had an exchange with the representatives of DO Home and DG Sante. Discussion was mainly about lack of funding for full capacity of the Forum’s work.

CSFD agreed on the working group framework. As the results, four working groups are created

  • WG1: EU drug policy
  • WG2: International drug policy
  • WG3: National drug policy
  • WG4: Emerging drug policy issues and cross-cutting issues

Forum elected DPNSEE Executive Director Milutin Milošević as Chair of the Working group 4.

 

Global Organized Crime Index

Posted on by Milutin

The Global Organized Crime Index published today by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC) provides the first-ever assessment of illicit economies in all 193 Member States of the United Nations. It shows the penetration of criminal markets, the risks and impact of organized crime, the dynamics of criminal actors, and the resilience of countries to deal with the problem.

The Index is the result of a two-year endeavour to evaluate levels of crime and resilience. Through this data, it is hoped that the Index will help inform a truly global response to the pervasive threat of transnational organized crime.

Because of its clandestine nature, however, often little is known about how organized crime operates in each country. To address this knowledge gap, the GI-TOC has developed the Global Organized Crime Index, a unique, data-driven analytical tool that evaluates 193 UN member states according to two metrics: according to their criminality on a score from 1 to 10 (lowest to highest organized crime levels), which in turn is based on their criminal markets score and criminal actors score; and according to their resilience to organized crime, from 1 to 10 (lowest to highest resilience levels).

The results of the first edition of the Global Organized Crime Index, outlined in the flagship report and the interactive Index website, paint a worrying picture of the reach, scale and impact of organized crime in 2020. Perhaps the most stark finding of the Index is that the majority of people worldwide live in countries with high levels of organized crime. The Index also shines a light on the ubiquity of some of the most insidious forms of exploitation that are perpetrated by criminal actors the world over, including individuals and networks operating from within the state apparatus. The Index also illustrates the widespread shortcomings in global levels of resilience to organized crime, from weaknesses in criminal justice systems to rampant corruption and violent crackdowns on the freedom of the press and civil society.

The Global Organized Crime Index is available following this link>>>.

 

The 5th EHRC programme announced

Posted on by Milutin

As we already wrote, the 5th European Harm Reduction Conference will be held from 10 to 12 November in Prague, Czech Republic and online.

The Conference organisers published the Program of the Conference which includes a variety of sessions on interesting topics. You can find the program following this link>>>.

DPNSEE is one of the organisations contributing to the programme. That includes participation in the panel “Quo vadis: the development of drug policy and harm reduction embedded into the broader development of societies in Europe” at the Plenary opening session S1.

Strategy Framework document drafted

Posted on by Milutin

At its meeting held from 16 to 18 September 2021, the DPNSEE Board had a very interesting and fruitful session with TACSO consultant Nenad Čelarević on Strategy review. Basis for the discussion was the draft strategic framework document prepared by the Working Group on Strategy Review.

The outcome of the session is the document that will be shared with the DPNSEE member organisations for consultations and proposals. In addition, severfal ideas for the draft DPNSEE Communications Strategy were generated. The consultant will process them and prepare the draft that will also be shared with the member organisations for consultations.

 

Social return on investment for HIV services

Posted on by Milutin

Countries in the Eastern Europe and Central Asia (EECA) region have made significant progress in setting the foundation for effective social contracting mechanisms. All of the countries have legal structures that allow them to contract NGOs for the provision of various HIV-related activities as well as provide care and support to PLHIV. However, some challenges remain, ranging from legal obstacles, complex bidding processes as well as lack of technical capacity (by NGOs) to participate in the bidding processes.

UNDP prepared the Policy Brief: Social Return on Investment for HIV services to explore this issue.

As the case studies featured in this brief have shown, activities that are conducted under the auspices of social contracting result in significant returns on investment: for each USD invested, there is a return in social investment of between 2 to 3 USD. These social returns include, inter alia, improved quality of life among PLHIV, numerous averted infections among key population groups, through counselling and distribution of needles and condoms, ultimately resulting in improved self-esteem and better quality of life among the key populations.

To access this document, please follow this link>>>.

Fulfilment of HIV-related sustainability commitments given by the Government of Serbia

Posted on by Milutin

The Eurasian Harm Reduction Association (EHRA) have published the report Republic of Serbia: Benchmarking Sustainability of the HIV Response in the Context of Transition from donor to domestic funding.

The aim of this analysis is to assess the fulfilment of HIV-related sustainability commitments given by the Government of Serbia in the context of the country’s transition from Global Fund support to national funding and uses the EHRA methodology, Benchmarking Sustainability of the HIV Response in the Context of Transition from Donor Funding which seeks to evaluate the achievement of the commitments by the Serbian Government to ensure the sustainability of HIV programmes. As a part of this study, the government’s commitments have been identified and prioritised and data collected to inform the extent to which those commitments have been fulfilled as planned.

Overall, the Government of the Republic of Serbia has shown moderate progress in fulfilling its transition and sustainability-related commitments. During the assessment, the commitments made by different health system domains have been reviewed, as well as the status of commitments made by different HIV programmatic areas. Out of 6 health system domains, significant progress was achieved in service delivery and human resources; average progress in drugs, supplies and equipment, and in data and information; while moderate progress has been made in health financing; and fairly low progress in governance.

With respect to programmatic areas, significant progress has been made concerning human rights, while substantial progress has been made in the fulfilment of the commitments related to prevention, treatment and support.

This publication was prepared by Maja Stošić, MD, PhD, EHRA Consultant.

The publication was published within the framework of the regional project called “Sustainability of Services for Key Populations in Eastern Europe and Central Asia” which is carried out by the Alliance for Public Health, in a consortium with the 100% Life (All-Ukrainian Network of PLWH), the Central Asian HIV’ Association and the Eurasian Key Populations Health Network with the aid from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria.

To access the report, follow this link>>>.

EHRA will hold a Webinar to present the assessment framework, methodology and results following by the discussion with webinar participants on Thursday 21 September at 14:00 Belgrade time. If interested, please register at  https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZAtd-ivrzkqH9xWxSzIjWS3Gbh8n361iNqI.

 

DPNSEE Board meeting

Posted on by Milutin

The DPNSEE Board met for the first time since the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic! Finally, we have the Board together in Belgrade, from 16 to 18 September 2021.

The meeting agenda included an extended point on updating on the situation in countries and organisations and activities in the recent period. Also, the Board discussed forthcoming activities, especially the 5th European Harm Reduction Conference, scheduled for 10 – 12 November 2021 in Prague, Czechia and online.

The Board had a very interesting and fruitful session with TACSO consultant Nenad Čelarević on Strategy review. Also, sustainability of the network was the inevitable issue to discuss.

 

Preparation call for CSFD members

Posted on by Milutin

The current Civil Society Forum on Drugs (CSFD) Core Group (which terminated their mandate) organised a preparation call for all CSFD members in the new mandate on 15 September.

During the meeting, a number of topics were discussed:

  • The rejected CSFD Proposal and the impact of this on the work of the new CSFD
  • The agenda of the first CSFD meeting scheduled for 6 – 7 October 2021
  • The working group structure of the new CSFD
  • All potential questions coming from CSFD members

The Drug Policy Network Youth East Europe have been selected as a member of the European Commission Expert Group – Civil Society Forum on Drugs 2021-2023.