Working with Everyone are compiling a fascinating history of drug user involvement.
April Wareham and the team from Working with Everyone have embarked on tracing the path of drug user involvement that takes them from the harm reduction pioneers of the 1980s with a backdrop of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, through the rise of the recovery movement, to the here and now. Some of the campaigning groups have grown and evolved into services; many, sadly, are just a memory of a newsletter or logo.
From galvanising to provide immediate support and harm reduction services, the drug-using community became involved in tackling the BBV epidemic, with members campaigning for support services, research, good medical treatment and the right to be part of policy decisions. Black Poppy magazine and The Methadone Alliance were among those fighting for appropriate treatment and OST.
There was little or no coordinated central strategic involvement outside of HIV prevention and treatment until the National Treatment Agency (NTA) was established in 2001 and promoted service user involvement groups funded by local drug action teams.
The dynamic shifted as local groups focused on service user delivery and organisations such as NUN and INPUD campaigned for human rights issues on a national or international level.
The rise of the recovery movement from around 2010 led to the promotion of abstinence-based recovery, and positive changes to many lives – but at what cost to those for whom abstinence was not realistic or desirable?
The history brings us up to the present day to look at the varied patchwork of groups striving for meaningful involvement with a value on lived experience. There is much still to explore and everything to fight for.
Can drug users, service users, people in recovery, patients, advocates, activists… take the lead on everything that affects them? Where do services fit in? How can everyone be heard? How can we make sure the opportunity, the passion and the action come from the grassroots?
Read the evolving history at workingwitheveryone.org.uk where it can be downloaded and printed. It’s a ‘live’ document where readers can add recollections, comments and opinions.