Drug user peace initiative: Violations of the human rights of people who use drugs

This report is one of five documents produced by the International Network of People who Use Drugs (INPUD) as part of their “Drug War Peace” initiative – relaunched in January 2015. This report focuses on how the war on drugs violates the very basic human right principles of people who use illicit drugs As the report states:

There are some groups for whom human rights do not appear to be even considered when formulating and applying The United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights. People who use illicit drugs are one such group. People who use drugs have their human rights violated systematically and endemically, and these human rights violations have grave impacts on wellbeing and health. In addition to the direct impacts of these human rights violations, they increase vulnerability to blood-borne infections such as HIV and hepatitis B and C.



“Published work documents widespread abuses of human rights, which increase vulnerability to HIV infection and negatively affect delivery of HIV programmes. These abuses include denial of harm-reduction services, discriminatory access to antiretroviral therapy, abusive law enforcement practices, and coercion in the guise of treatment for drug dependence.” (Jürgens et al., 2010: 475)

Click here to read the full publication.

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