In today’s global health landscape we are witnessing a general movement away from external, international funding, and towards national health budgeting for public health. As many countries are overwhelmed with this task we will need innovative funding mechanisms in order to achieve the goal of ending HIV and hepatitis in Europe. This is why HA-REACT held a meeting on “The Financing and Sustainability of Harm Reduction Services in the EU” as part of WP8 “sustainability and long-term funding”, at the Eurasian Harm Reduction Network (EHRN) first Regional Conference for central and eastern Europe and central Asia in Vilnius, Lithuania.
The meeting was geared towards regional planning as well as sharing knowledge and experience with the objective to coordinate efforts to improve the funding and sustainability of harm reduction services. Clinicians, NGOs, independent consultants, public health experts as well as national representatives from health institutions were all active participants in this sub-conference meeting.
Summary of main points:
- Effective and continuous advocacy is necessary for sustainable harm reduction, using sound evidence and addressing all stakeholders.
- There has been a surge in political will aimed at elimination of viral hepatitis – this must be capitalized on to further show the economic, financial and social benefits harm reduction in particular will have for a society. One of the presenters stated it best when he said: “We need to start putting a price tag on things.”
- Echoing one of the points of the conference, there was a strong call to prioritize moving money from a criminal approach to populations who inject drugs to an approach that focuses on reducing negative health consequences associated with drug use.
- Participants agreed that funds must additionally be reallocated from the general health system to specific harm reduction services. However, the country example of Lithuania showed that while money has been made available for harm reduction, proper management is key in order to use the funds effectively and sustainably.
The HA-REACT Joint Action anticipates that this event will be the kick-off for a series of meetings. We are currently preparing a document with summary guidelines on funding instruments for harm reduction, including all the outcomes of this meeting. This is the next important step in making the financing of harm reduction sustainable in the European region.