Care during COVID-19: Drug use, harm reduction, and intimacy during a global pandemic

Schlosser, Allison V.; Harris, Shana

doi:10.1016/j.drugpo.2020.102896

Cited by 52 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Border closures in response to the COVID-19 pandemic may compound the risk of drug contamination by limiting drug importation ( Beletsky & Davis, 2017 ; RCCET, 2020 ). Additionally, physical distancing measures imposed as a result of the pandemic may reduce the capacity of spaces such as shelters and supervised injection sites, increasing the likelihood of someone using drugs in public or while alone ( Schlosser & Harris, 2020 ). Using drugs in public settings is associated with a range of harms, including elevated risk of BBV infection and overdose ( Trayner et al, 2020 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The COVID-19 pandemic represents both a health and an economic crisis, and may engender psychological distress, anxiety, and grief, as well as potential increases in drug use as people cope with these negative feelings ( Panchal et al, 2020 ). Physical distancing measures may hinder access to supports such as group therapy and disrupt social solidarity among people who use drugs, exacerbating any negative psychological consequences of the pandemic ( Schlosser & Harris, 2020 ). Social and psychological support services may need to consider provisions to provide access to the appropriate technology for therapy by telephone or videoconference.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Women who use drugs may be particularly affected by these changes given existing gender-related barriers to accessing services and exposure to gendered violence ( Collins, Boyd, Czechaczek, Hayashi, & McNeil, 2020 ; Malinowska-Sempruch, 2015 ). The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic are still emerging, but increased risks of overdose and other drug-related harms are expected across a range of outcomes for people who use drugs ( Chang, Agliata, & Guarinieri, 2020 ; Jacka, Phipps, & Marshall, 2020 ; Schlosser & Harris, 2020 ).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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A rapid review of the impacts of “Big Events ” on risks, harms, and service delivery among people who use drugs: Implications for responding to COVID-19

Zolopa

Høj

Bruneau

et al. 2021

International Journal of Drug Policy

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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A rapid review of the impacts of “Big Events ” on risks, harms, and service delivery among people who use drugs: Implications for responding to COVID-19

Zolopa

Høj

Bruneau

et al. 2021

International Journal of Drug Policy

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“…Social relationships between people who use drugs are equally often mischaracterised as purely pragmatic or based predominantly on need, although there is increasing recognition that these, as with all relationships, are often grounded in bonds of care, love, trust, and solidarity ( 2 , 4 ). Relationships need not be defined through substances, though substance use itself can produce forms of social, physical, and emotional intimacy that facilitate everyday survival ( 56 ). Circumstances of precarity, vulnerability and crises – such as the pandemic – can, however, serve to complicate and disrupt social relationships, exposing individuals to the harms of isolation.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Isolation, Solitude and Social Distancing for People Who Use Drugs: An Ethnographic Perspective

et al. 2021

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COVID-19 has resulted in deepened states of crisis and vulnerability for people who use drugs throughout Europe and across the world, with social distancing measures having far-reaching implications for everyday life. Prolonged periods of isolation and solitude are acknowledged within much addiction literature as negatively impacting the experiences of those in recovery, while also causing harm to active users – many of whom depend on social contact for the purchasing and taking of substances, as well as myriad forms of support. Solitude, however, is proposed by the authors as inherent within some aspects of substance use, far from particular to the current pandemic. Certain forms of substance use engender solitary experience, even where use is predicated upon the presence of others. Adopting a cross-disciplinary perspective, this paper takes as its focus the urgent changes wrought by the pandemic upon everyday life for people who use drugs, drawing on recent ethnographic fieldwork with substance users in Scotland. Beyond the current crises, the paper proposes solitude, and by extension isolation, as an analytical framework for better apprehending lived experiences of substance use.

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“…There is an abundance of evidence linking reductions in NSP access and service use to increased sharing of used injecting equipment ( Broadhead et al, 1999 , Ivsins et al, 2012 , Macneil and Pauly, 2010 ), putting people at increased risk of acquiring infections, such as HIV and HCV. As highlighted in this special issue, the COVID-19 pandemic has presented people working in harm reduction with a stark challenge in determining how best to reconfigure interventions that hinge on the physical, social, and emotional intimacies of drug use ( Schlosser & Harris, 2020 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

COVID-19 and the health of people who use drugs: What is and what could be?

Grebely

Cerdá

Rhodes

2020

International Journal of Drug Policy

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SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has changed the world as we know it, and continues to do so. How COVID-19 affects people who use drugs, the environments in which they live, and capacities of response, warrants immediate attention. This special issue begins to map how COVID-19 is altering the health of people who use drugs, including in relation to patterns of drug use, service responses, harms that may relate to drug use, interventions to reduce risk of harms, COVID-19 health, and drug policies. We emphasise the need to envisage COVID-19 and its effects as a matter of intersecting ‘complex adaptive systems’: that is, the impacts of COVID-19 extend beyond the virus and related illness conditions to encompass multiple social, cultural, economic, policy and political effects; and these affect the health of people who use drugs directly as well as indirectly by altering the risk and enabling environments in which they live. We synthesize emergent evidence on the impact of COVID-19 on the health of people who use drugs. A key concern we identify is how to sustain policy and service delivery improvements prompted by COVID-19. We need to maintain an ethos of emergent adaptation and experimentation towards the creation of safer environments in relation to the health of people who use drugs.

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Care during COVID-19: Drug use, harm reduction, and intimacy during a global pandemic

Cited by 52 publications

References 11 publications

A rapid review of the impacts of “Big Events ” on risks, harms, and service delivery among people who use drugs: Implications for responding to COVID-19

A rapid review of the impacts of “Big Events ” on risks, harms, and service delivery among people who use drugs: Implications for responding to COVID-19

Isolation, Solitude and Social Distancing for People Who Use Drugs: An Ethnographic Perspective

COVID-19 and the health of people who use drugs: What is and what could be?

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