1,500 EXPERTS ON DRUG ABUSE EXPECTED AT CONFERENCE

HARM REDUCTION: 1 in 20 People Use Drugs, Says Delegate

It's fitting that an elite conference on drug abuse has come to
Vancouver, a city where the global scourge affects not just society's
outcasts.

The 17th International Conference on the Reduction of Drug-Related
Harm runs today through Thursday at the Hotel Vancouver.

More than 1,500 delegates from 93 countries are expected, with an
eclectic speakers list ranging from politician-turned-HIV/AIDS
activist Stephen Lewis to maverick Nashville Rev. Edwin Sanders, whose
gift of needles for drug users shocked conservative Tennessee.

"I think the general public forgets about the normality of substance
use," says conference co-chairwoman Sue Currie.

"Over 12 per cent of deaths globally are related to tobacco, alcohol
and illicit drugs."

A hepatitis C expert who in the 1990s helped pioneer detox facilities
for users and safer working conditions for prostitutes in the Downtown
Eastside, Currie had a message for those tired of more stories about
the "woes of life on the mean streets."

"One of the big issues is really educating the public about substance
use," she says, adding that the global picture is ugly.

"Right now, there are 200 million adults worldwide who had used
illicit drugs in the past 12 months," says Currie, the
associate-director of the hep-C resource program at a war veterans'
medical facility in San Francisco.

"That includes injection drugs, marijuana, opiates, the whole
range.

"That's one in 20 persons. That's huge. The other things that really
can bring the issue home . . . is that prevention, early intervention
and any form of drug treatment is a cost-effective way to reduce harm
to the entire community.

"For every dollar spent on drug treatment or harm-reduction strategy,
it saves about $7 of taxpayer money."

Major topics at the conference include the impact of the increasingly
conservative U.S. on other country's drug and harm-reduction policies,
alcohol as a legal epidemic, vaccines to fight addictions, the role of
policing, coping with HIV/AIDS in Brazil and a debate on marijuana:
legalization or decriminalization.