LIVING WITH CRYSTAL METH

Conference Comes Under Attack For Harm-Reduction Approach

For Brian Finch, crystal meth was part of a mid-life crisis. It helped him
escape from the day-to-day realities of living with HIV, energized his love
life and made him feel sexy.

All his friends were taking it. Although he watched some of them spend
exorbitant amounts of money on the drug and lose their jobs when their
habits started to affect their ability to work, he continued doing crystal
from the late 1990s up until 2003. "I wasn't spending tons of money and I
was maintaining a manageable life. So I didn't think I had problem," he
says. "The problem was, it was making me more and more sick."

His adherence to his meds became sporadic. Crystal wasn't the only drug in
his party regimen. He also took GHB and ecstasy.

"I literally thought I was going to end up dead or in jail. I overdosed
twice. That wasn't even enough to get me to stop," he says. "I had to cut
all my ties with everybody and stay home alone because everyone I know was
doing it."

Now off party drugs, Finch volunteers as the Ontario representative for the
Canadian Treatment Action Council (CTAC).

Last month he attended the First National Conference On Methamphetamine,
HIV And Hepatitis in Salt Lake City, Utah on behalf of CTAC.

The two-day conference brought together 900 law enforcement agents,
scientists, outreach workers, treatment specialists and social marketers.
The conference was organized by Salt Lake City's Harm Reduction Project and
was the first of its kind.

The event opened with a keynote address by Patricia Case, assistant
professor in Harvard Medical School's School Of Social Medicine, who gave a
history of methamphetamine and challenged the prevailing notion that its
use is epidemic is sweeping North America. She argued that meth is just the
latest trend in North American society's historical love affair with
stimulants.

One of the key topics discussed at the conference was strategies for
anti-crystal campaigns. Compared with the US, Finch says Canadian drug
policy and awareness campaigns tend to be more pragmatic, non-judgmental
and open-ended. A lot of the anti-crystal campaigns south of the border
focus on "Just Say No"-style messages such as the blunt "Buy crystal, get
HIV free!" campaign produced by Aidsmeds.com in New York City (for more on
Aidsmeds.com turn to page 14).

A hard-line abstinence-only message is prevalent in the US, especially in
Republican-dominated Utah where the focus is on criminalization. Members of
Congress, the US Senate and media attacked the conference as a taking a
soft approach and promoting a pro-legalization agenda.

In a letter to the US Department Of Health And Human Services, one of the
major sponsors of the conference, US Republican Congressman Mark Souder
condemned the conference's harm reduction approach, arguing that it
undermines US federal policies on drugs.

"That administration officials from your department are consulting with
harm-reduction advocates ... and sponsoring conferences controlled by the
harm-reduction network completely undermines the work of the president, the
Congress and the men and women who work in law enforcement across the
nation who are trying desperately to fight the meth epidemic," Souder
wrote, according to the Washington Times.

Salt Lake City's mayor Rocky Anderson, an outspoken critic of the Bush
administration and its policies, defended the conference during an address.
He stressed that more money is needed for treatment and called the "Just
Say No" approach a "dismal failure."

"The mayor really put himself out there," says Nick Boyce, who attended the
conference on behalf of the AIDS Committee Of Toronto (ACT). "In the
political climate he's in, I have a lot of respect for him. It gave me a
sense of hope."

Finch admits the overwhelming amount of information at the conference
initially prompted him to think the hard-line approach was the right one.

"As a former user, my first reaction was, 'We need to have a clampdown and
we really need to stigmatize this,'" he says. "And as I walked away I
realized that's not going to work."

Going clean and cutting ties with his party lifestyle worked for Finch, but
he points out that may not work for everyone. He says that strong
peer-to-peer support alongside nonjudgmental campaigns and treatment will
ultimately help gay and bisexual men make healthy choices.

Once the addiction is beaten, Finch says, the original feelings of
depression, loneliness and anxiety linger, posing a new challenge: facing
your feelings without turning back to drugs.

"You really have to learn to have sex all over again," he says. "After not
doing crystal, sex seems dull and boring. Why bother?"

Along with the chemical effects of drugs like crystal, outreach workers at
organizations like CTAC and ACT say that social attitudes specific to the
queer community play a part in men's decisions to have unprotected sex,
thereby increasing the risk of HIV transmission.

Boyce, ACT's gay men's harm reduction coordinator, says ACT intends to
launch a crystal awareness campaign at the end of the year that will draw
on interviews with crystal users, ex-users and nonusers and target the
reasons why some men have unprotected sex when high.

"A lot of men want to connect with other men. It's a very sexualized
culture, we've been conditioned to think about sex and to have sex," says
Boyce. "Some men feel guilty about being gay, about having sex. It may not
be overt, but subtle reasons play out in your head."

Although the sense is that gay men use crystal mainly for sex, heterosexual
men take it as an energy booster and for partying - sex isn't in the top
three reasons. A trucker might take it to stay awake while on a long haul,
while street youth get into because it's a cheap high. Some people,
primarily women, use it to lose weight.

In Utah, a state with 2.2-million citizens, there are 10 crystal anonymous
groups. In Toronto, home to 2.48 million people, the city's only crystal
anonymous group met last month at the 519 Community Centre for the first time.

The group will continue to meet weekly from 3pm to 5pm at the 519 Community
Centre (519 Church St) on Saturdays.

[Sidebar]

Act Gets Hard On Crystal

Kevin Ritchie

After months of pressure from local activists, the AIDS Committee Of
Toronto (ACT) has firmed up its position on crystal methamphetamine,
clearly acknowledging a link between its use and unprotected sex among gay
and bisexual men.

"Anecdotal evidence suggests that crystal meth leads some men to engage in
unprotected sex when they normally wouldn't," states a fact sheet published
on ACT's website last month. "It should be noted, however, that while some
research studies support this, others are inconclusive."

In June, ACT's director of communications and community relations John
Maxwell told Xtra the link was "not clear at all," and pointed to
contradictory research, which concluded gay men were no more likely to
engage in unsafe sex while high on crystal than while using other drugs,
such as marijuana.

But now ACT's communications coordinator Tyler Steim says the organization
recognized the link all along.

"ACT has always acknowledged a connection between crystal meth and HIV
transmission," says Steim. "What we have been reluctant to do - especially
in light of the recent hysteria surrounding meth and HIV in the US - is
overstate that link and represent crystal meth and HIV as a simple
cause-and-effect relationship."

Steim says the agency never tried to downplay a link between crystal use
and HIV transmission, but rather that it was attempting to counter
hard-line views by pointing to complexities around crystal use in the queer
community.

The new fact sheet points to "underlying cultural issues/attitudes within
the gay and bisexual community" which lead men to take sexual risks when
high on crystal meth. For example, men might take crystal to escape from
the day-to-day realities of HIV treatment, to feel desirable or to combat
depression and feelings of guilt.

"Ultimately, what we were saying wasn't getting across," he says. "We
should have been timelier with our position statement, but [we] stand by
the harm-reduction approach we've taken to date."

Steim adds that ACT has applied for a research grant to study the link
between crystal meth and HIV transmission and hopes to begin an awareness
campaign later this year.

Greg Downer, a volunteer safer-sex educator with ACT who was suspended for
criticizing the organization's soft position on crystal, says he's pleased
with the change.

"The fact sheet is clear, concise, to the point and very representative of
the reality crystal presents to the community," says Downer. "There's no
ambiguity. People can now make informed decisions."

Downer, who was forced to take a six-month leave from the Gay Men's
Outreach Program last April, says he's hoping to return earlier now that
his point of view is no longer in conflict with ACT. Steim declined to
comment on Downer's situation citing confidentiality issues.

ACT isn't the only organization that's taking crystal more seriously
lately. The federal government recently announced a reclassification of the
drug from a schedule three classification under the Controlled Drugs And
Substances to a schedule one classification, placing it on par with cocaine
and heroin. That means tougher penalties for those caught producing,
trafficking or selling the drug. In addition, stricter controls on the
chemicals used to make crystal are expected to be announced soon.

The AIDS Committee Of Toronto's new fact sheet on crystal meth can be found
at Actoronto.org/website/home.nsf/cl/act.docs.0468.