NEWSLETTER FEBRUARY 2021 Women who use drugs and peer workers in South Africa Women who use drugs face many additional problems compared to their male counterparts. The harm reduction field far too often neglects the needs of women. To some extent, the same is true for peer workers: incredibly valuable staff in any impactful service. How can local services make sure that peer workers are valued, supported and living up to their full potential? Mainline sets out to ask, learn and train in 2021. Read more Mainline – Technical Advice Did Mainline become a supplier? Yes: a supplier of technical advice for the Global Fund. Harm reduction organisations and networks of people who use drugs across the world can now request a Mainline training or capacity building. Read more about how this works. Read more Being young, wild and ... free? - in Kenya and South Africa Young people use drugs - including minors. It's an inconvenient truth: societies usually seek to prevent young people from damaging their health and there is a big taboo on drug use among young kids. But are stigma, legislation or moral judgement keeping young people away from harm reduction services? This project aims to find and improve access to services. Read more Gender-based violence in Kenya Women who use drugs in Kenya face violence every day at home and on the streets as well as by the police and their communities. A unique study - conducted in Mombasa, Kenya - sheds light on the tough realities these women encounter. Urgent action is needed now. Read more Stimulant harm reduction in Indonesia: an evaluation Harm reduction for people who use the stimulant drug crystal-methamphetamine was first piloted in Indonesia in 2017. Karisma Foundation set out to find the best strategies to open their services to the needs of a new group of people in Jakarta. Mainline supported Karisma in the years that followed and collaborated with Atma Jaya Catholic University in Jakarta to link new practices with research. A track record describes our joint efforts in the past five years. The harm reduction services for people who use methamphetamines have now been evaluated. This has resulted in more concrete recommendations to further improve and continue this important work in the front line. Chemsex e-learning part II: almost ready! We are excited to announce that the second part of our Chemsex e-learning programme is on its way. Do you want to know more about the underlying issues, interventions, outreach programming and support with leaving the scene? If so, Chemsex: Part 2 is for you! The new modules are expected to be released by the end of March 2021. This gives you just about enough time to enrol in the first part. Read more High HIV risks for the partners of people who use drugs in Pakistan Harm reduction services mostly focus on HIV prevention among people who inject drugs. But what about the HIV risks of their partners? A new study identified a 8.5% HIV prevalence for the female partners of men who inject heroin in Pakistan. Additional efforts are needed to reduce HIV transmission among female spouses. Making HIV pre-exposure prophylaxis (PreP) available to female spouses at high risk of HIV transmission - particularly young women with fewer children and those whose husbands are not receiving or who have difficulty adhering to ART - should be considered. Read more Find a trainer in your region Are you looking for a certified harm reduction trainer? A group of trainers recently graduated from Mainline’s train-the-trainer programme. Find a trainer in your region and contact us for more information. Read more Quality of life for people who access the needle exchange in Tanzania Needle and syringe exchange programmes bring down HIV infections. We have known that for decades. But does needle exchange also improve the quality of life of people who use drugs? Research from Tanzania says it does. Needle exchange in Dar es Salaam connects people to other health services, helps people to reunify with family and helps people to reduce and control potential harms associated with their drug use. Read the fact sheet of this new study: the full report will be available on our website soon. You receive this newsletter because you have opted in or you have a relationship with us. Forward this newsletter If you no longer wish to receive our emails, you can unsubscribe here. © Mainline. All rights reserved.