Time flies, and we are happy to be back with our regular report!
One of our latest cases
In November 2020 Elena was detained by Rosgvardia officers and sent for an examination. It revealed that her analyzes contained traces of drugs (marijuana, alpha-PVP). And an administrative offense case for using drugs in a public place was initiated against Elena.
At the beginning of 2021, Elena asked the ARF team for legal assistance, and her defense was represented in court by our lawyer Timur Madatov.
At the court sessions, police officers, who opened an administrative offense case, were questioned and they could not say for sure whether Elena had been using drugs at the time of her arrest or not.
Elena testified: «I am a person with problematic drug use and, naturally, because of this, there were traces of drugs in my biomaterial, but this did not mean that I had used them in a public place. Most likely that day I used them at home».
As a result, on February 17, 2021, the court ruled to dismiss the case and found Elena innocent. Thanks to your support we are able to keep fighting for justice!
Now, go catch up with our updates
We want to start with a recent Politico article on our work and role in the drug policy:
«I wanted to share a great piece that Politico did on our work in Moscow. In a final case study of a two years series on the global HIV situation, they explore ARF's case of building up services for the most vulnerable, criminalized, stigmatized, underserved (and huge!) group in Russia — people who use drugs. In 2009 Kremlin has proclaimed the official turn on HIV policy — from at least pretending to follow the world best practices to an ideology of 'Russia's own way', 'traditional values', 'healthy lifestyle', 'zero tolerance' and other conservative outdated second-hand rhetoric. As a result, Russia is currently among very few countries where HIV is on the rise, while also actively blocking the global progress and political agreements towards HIV elimination. The same 2009 was also the year when ARF was established and set off to develop an organic, resilient, community-based, horizontal platform of public health resistance to the dictatorship and ever intensifying war on drugs. Thanks to everyone who helped and supported us, we are still up and running despite everything», — Anya Sarang, ARF president
Some quick fundraising recap of the past few months:
What is more, we are expanding our team! A volunteer coordinator Rita joined us in August, and now we aim to systemize and develop our volunteer work. Also this month a driver for our outreach bus Yaroslav has joined! And it is a big step for us in making our outreach work more sustainable and efficient.
Last but not least, remember our Family project? Under this project we support families of our participants with kids in order to help them spend more time together. Annually we help families to get ready for the school year. This time 15 families got our help — check out the attached pictures by our volunteers. Additionally, we collected the school supplies for our participants’ families in collaboration with the Moscow independent space ‘delai kulturu’.
What is next?
Next week GlobalGiving is running a Little by Little matching campaign for any donations under $50. It will last 5 days, from 7am September 13th till 7am September 18th (all time is GMT+3, Moscow time).
All unique per donor donations under $50 will be doubled! So if you want to double your impact this season, then save the date: 13.09-18.09!
AND ONCE AGAIN THANK YOU!
Best regard and take care,
Ira
ARF fundraiser
Links:
The second quarter of 2021 was full of events, and today we want to share a quick recap of our achievements and updates.
To start with, one of the biggest news for us was the final expansion of our Moscow office. Starting from December 1st we got an opportunity to rent an additional room in the same building where our office is located (although the repairment was required at first). And on the 24th of April we finally had a house-warming party in the new, expanded and repaired office. It really would never be possible without your donations and all other forms of support!
Thanks to the expansion of the office, we now have the following opportunities:
In May we ran a short fundraising campaign to raise money for the office furniture. And we once again received a great level of love! We were supported by 50 donors including our participants, and in total we raised $520 which covered 60% of our expenses. The other 40% of expenses we covered with the grant money. If you want to read some heartwarming stories about the office from our staff members, then follow the hashtag #supporttheARFoffice on facebook.
And once you are in Moscow and COVID restrictions are less harsh, please do come visit us in our office!
In the beginning of June, before the pandemic hit hard again in Moscow, we were lucky to organize the COVID-safe School of ARF outreach volunteers. It was a 2-day event held on the 5-6th of June to cover the theoretical aspects of our work. We got 33 applications, and we chose 20 people to invite as the school participants. Overall, 5 ARF team members prepared the schedule of the school, the agenda, presentations and materials, and ran this very intense yet rewarding weekend.
Now, we have 20 potential outreach volunteers who are getting experience in the ARF field work, learning all the necessary information on the HIV and AIDS, HCV, overdoses, STI, harm reduction and many more. The next step is an informal «exam», and then they will join the AFR outreach team. We are really excited to expand our team of volunteers, and it is always special to find more like-minded souls who are happy to contribute their time to helping people who use drugs in Moscow!
Andrey, who was one of the organizers of the School of ARF outreach volunteers, shared his thoughts: «The people who joined our School were completely different! Despite that, everyone quickly found a common language with each other, and were motivated to participate in the School. The theoretical part went well, the participants asked a lot of questions and were involved in the learning process».
Asya, ARF case manager and one of the organizers of the School, left her opinion: «As one of the lectors of ARF’s course for outreach volunteers I want to share this incredible experience. Every time we organize these courses it’s impossible to predict just one particular “type” of our students. We meet people with totally different backgrounds, social circles, socialization degrees and involvement in general. But they all definitely have something in common — hearts of our students can’t accept the current general situation with the attitude to drug users. Every ARF’s course for outreach volunteers is precious for me because I observe how totally different people find at least one common point of contact. This motivates me a lot and every time reminds how important our work is»
Moreover, we decided that to grow the team of volunteers professionally, we need to have a volunteer coordinator. This is why we are doing an open call for this vacancy! We are accepting the applications till 4:20am July 5th via https://bit.ly/ARFvacancy. If you know those who will be perfect for this, please send them the link!
What is next?
On July 14th GlobalGiving is running a new matching campaign for donations starting from $100. It will last for 15 hours, from 4pm July 14th till 7am July 15th (all time is GMT+3, Moscow time). The July Bonus Day 2021 campaign will have a Matching Fund of $400,000 USD.
While funds remain, the following matching structure will apply:
So if you want to provide not only extra support to our work but also to elevate your donations, then save the date!
AND ONCE AGAIN THANK YOU!
Best regard and take care,
Ira
ARF fundraiser
Links:
2020 has been a difficult year for everyone, but it also taught us new lessons. The pandemic-related economic challenges produced new political insecurities and in Russia that resulted to even more pressure on civil society organizations and activists. The Ministry of Justice has recently included a fresh bunch of HIV/harm reduction organizations were just in the Foreign Agents Registry; the rules of the registry have toughened; distributing drug-safety related information is becoming a criminal offence, and the room for manoeuvre for community organizations is becoming ever tighter. The Kremlin has accepted the new Drug Strategy re-affirming its commitment to the war on drugs, zero tolerance and opposition to harm reduction and science-based interventions.
Meanwhile, ARF is continuing to bring essential services to people affected by Russia's war on drugs. For most of 2020, ARF harm reduction work has been supported through the Elton John AIDS Foundation and Solidarité SIDA as well as through crowdfunding - thanks to our incredible supporters! With your support, we helped 3779 people, providing health and human rights information, materials, referral, and support. We assisted 256 people to further professional medical help, and to the hospitals, our participants have received 640 legal/ human rights services, including consultations, representation, court hearings, complaints compilations etc. We have received reports of 758 lives saved with the help of our Naloxone. This number is almost twice bigger than in the previous years, indicating that the opiate overdoses' problem remains highly significant. We continue our public campaign and communication with the Ministries for the availability of non-prescription Naloxone and exploring new opportunities for service delivery.
In 2020 we had to give a lot of thought to sustainability strategies. We had to learn to adjust services quickly in response to the changing context and needs. We survived COVID without major service interruptions thanks to our expanding volunteers network and peer support. Through advocacy, mass-media work, public education, we promote the importance of the humane approach to drug policy. The message is getting more and more accepted by the general public. The growing public awareness contributes to new solidarities, and our crowdfunding is becoming a more significant contribution to our services. In 2020 we also dropped our first merchandise, which you hopefully already have! :)
COVID, isolation, economic insecurity, a new wave of political repressions and prosecutions in Russia are taking a tough tall on people's mental health. One of the key developments of 2020 is expanding ARF mental health services, as demand for these services is becoming more articulated. We now have two psychologists, a psychiatrist and developing a community-peer-support program on mental health. Another essential key topic that we worked on in 2020 is people with intersecting vulnerabilities: sex workers, gay men who use drugs, mothers who use drugs.
At the end of the year, we organized two important events - the children bookstore Marshak has supported our yearly New Year celebration. Together, we brought presents and joy to many families of our participants. We have also co-organized an art auction benefiting prisoners of the Russian war on drugs.
Just in one week, on March 8th we will launch our study report on violence against women who use drugs and start the development of a protocol for the in-house and referral service for victims of gender-based violence. The same week from March 8 to 14 the GlobalGiving will increase all the donations up to 50 Euro by 50% allowing our supporters a great chance to increase their impact.
We would like to wish everyone a wonderful spring and use this chance to thank you once again for your support of our work, and we hope we will be able to find new ways to stay strong and resilient in 2021!
Links:
Starting November 1, 2020 Andrey Rylkov Foundation for Health and Social Justice (ARF) will be able to continue its harm reduction services in Moscow through the Positive Action Harm Reduction HIV Challenge award by ViiV Healthcare.
While funding for HIV prevention work in key populations became almost impossible to secure either through international or domestic sources, we are happy that we will be able to continue our work. ARF received the Positive Action Challenge Grand Award in the amount of 75 000 GBP in June 2020. The decision to award ARF was announced at a Virtual AIDS-2020 Conference the same month. Positive Action Challenges seek to find innovative solutions to a particular issue or challenge. The Harm Reduction Challenge sought innovative ideas for community or peer-led initiatives or programmes that provide comprehensive, innovative and accessible harm reduction services at the community level for people who inject drugs.
„Winners of the Positive Action Harm Reduction Challenge enact community or peer-led approaches to non-stigmatising, inclusive and comprehensive harm reduction and HIV care. Approaches like these help to meaninfully engage and involve people who inject drugs and help to address the rising HIV epidemic in the community,“ said Jennifer Carpenter, ViiV Healthcare Positive Action Breakthrough Manager.
The award will help ARF cover core harm reduction services to people who inject drugs on the streets of Moscow and keep exploring ways to improve key populations access to HIV prevention and treatment by placing more focus on mental health support, with a specific objectives to:
The Andrey Rylkov Foundation is a grass-roots organization based in Moscow working since 2009. Our mission is to promote and develop humane drug policy based on tolerance, protection of health, dignity and human rights. In advancing its mission, ARF engages in 5 key strategies:
While the award will help to cover essential services and staff, ARF donor funding for harm reduction has decreased by 40% in 2021. We are compensating with the ever growing contribution of our amazing volunteers network and through crowdfunding. We therefore use this opportunity to thank once again our volunteers and supporters for providing key support to our activities which becomes even more essential in these challenging times.
Links:
COVID in Moscow. ARF grows new roots and branches.
On March 30 Moscow went on lockdown. COVID pandemic has hit hard on the city as a whole, from education to businesses. Still, people who use drugs once again proved to be one of the most vulnerable and unprotected groups - socially, economically, health and human rights wise. A couple of weeks into the pandemic a lot of our participants have found themselves in very dare circumstances - many lost their random or more regular jobs and incomes while drug-related needs, costs and risks have steeply increased. People who are dependent on drugs, especially opiates, such as heroin and street methadone, were hit heavy. Medical methadone and buprenorphine are banned in Russia, other types of drug treatment include in-patient "detox" with the use of neuroleptics and antipsychotics in state drug treatment centres, but even these centres have started to shut their doors on people with drug problems since the medical facilities were getting converted into COVID-observatories. The first drug treatment departments to close were those for women.
COVID immidiately magnified the harms of drug criminalization. Legal risks have soared. In Moscow most drug trade is made via messengers and dark-web: after completing payment, the user receives geo-coordinates of the newly aquired 'treasure' and has to pick it up in person -- e.g. dig it up in the woods, in a park, find magneted to a bench, a house entrance etc. It is impossible to get drugs by mail as mail is very unreliable and controlled by police. In addition to routine insecurities of going out to unknown places in order to pick up drugs and risking police abuse, extortion of money, arbitrary detentions and arrests, new threats emerged. Streets became empty while the number of cops out actually increased even more - they were assigned to check peoples lock-out permissions. The liability of being out without a permission was yet an additional risk. And of course, getting the virus was a risk in itself. Due to fast-paced economic crisis more people started to seek small jobs in drug business (eg “kladmen” - people who deliver ‘treasures’ to the hiding spots), which of course made them more vulnerable to police. In response to the unfolding endangering environments, we had to step up our legal services and communicate legal advice and tips via social networks and individually.
We were keen on organizing rapid monitoring of our participants' needs, problems and opinions on how our services could be adjusted. Our case managers had long phone/telegram talks with the regular clients, and in addition, we ran two open community surveys via Telegram. The first ran in the first week of the quarantine, and 400 people took part, the second -- a month later, included a little over 200 people. The first one focused on the new problems and challenges; the latter aimed to capture what resources people used to improve self-support and well-being.
The main apparent problems were poverty-related insecurities and absence of economic safety nets. The response of the Russian government to the COVID problem was to announce two months of vacation, thus putting the burden of citizens support on business and employers, so most people were fired or not paid. In our survey, 58% of people reported that they did not have any money left, or a source of income or support. Among our participants, women sex workers had to bear additional risks - while most still risked their health and provided services during quarantine, but their revenues significantly dropped.
Access to drugs was another major issue, 65% said they experienced a shortage in access and 45% reported increased pressure from the cops. Nevertheless, 37% decided to get drugs in the same way as they did before. Some people chose to stock up with larger quantities of drugs, which made them more vulnerable from the police perspective. But most couldn't afford stock ups, so they continued going out every day. Seven per cent of our respondents decided to go cold turkey and wait for the abstinence to wear off; others chose to decrease the volume and move to pharmacy drugs or alcohol.
As a follow up with drugs insecurities and pressure of isolation, the mental health issues became of top concerns and absence of relevant services became more visible -- 66% participants said that they experienced mental health problems: anxiety, loneliness, depression. Access to any support became more problematic - mental health support in Russia is mostly provided through the private sector, which makes it financially inaccessible for the majority of our participants. But even those who could afford some services now and then before the crisis, had to discontinue due to financial hardship. Many people who struggle with dependence chose NA groups as a source of support but those also closed or moved online. We also had to shut down our tiny office where we usually provide space for community support initiatives: from family groups for people with drug dependency to chemsex support group to NA and clubs of interests. Besides, we used this space for legal/health/psychology consultations and our team meetings and supervision. Without the office, we had to move most of our support initiatives online or on hold. ARF volunteers started a new Telegram group chat focused on surviving quarantine and peer support/fun. We also brainstormed how we could extend our mental health services. We started a telephone/Telegram hotline, engaged with two additional psychologists who agreed to consult our clients regularly. We realized that it is vital to expand knowledge on tools of emotional support to the communities and asked our consulting psychologists to organize webinars.
Globally COVID emphasized the urgency of response to domestic violence. ARF still doesnt have working algorithms to bring up the issue and respond to it. ARF case manager Yekaterina Selivanova is working on the case of a woman and her husband, who both have drug dependence, and he also has a mental health disorder. They have a seven-year-old kid. Periodically, the husband beats and insults his wife, including in front of their son, and this lasts for years. Because of this, she has to leave home, even during the quarantine. She has nowhere to go: she does not have her own living space, job. Women shelters in Moscow do not accept women with dependence. ARF has intensified collaboration with the Center "Sisters" that assists female victims of violence. Sisters will provide training for ARF team of outreach, lawyers and volunteers and help establish an algorithm of working with women who reported domestic or sexual or other abuse (eg by partners, public services or police).
Besides responding to new emergencies, ARF had to change daily outreach and delivery scheme. We normally deliver daily services (5-6 days a week) and materials with the help of our mini-bus and foot outreach, for the new scheme of outreach delivery or prevention materials we had to rely on our participants themselves and this worked solid. In consultation with everyone, we came to the solution to distribute the materials via the networks of regular participants/ community volunteers. Moscow is very spread out, so we agreed with several community volunteers in different districts. Couple times a week we would provide them stocks of prevention materials and HIV self-tests to distribute it in their local networks through contactless arrangements. It worked very well, and while we reached out to fewer clients than usual, we are glad that our services continued to reach the most in need. In two months, we served almost 600 clients and received 27 reports of lives saved from a lethal overdose using our Naloxone. In addition to the satisfaction that we didn't have to interrupt services despite the new challenging environment, it was very inspiring to witness the miracle of community mobilization taking real dimensions. The community networks and systems of mutual help that we aspired to nurture and support through the years suddenly became very tangible and real. A lot of people offered help, and we managed to re-organize our work safely and smoothly.
We also continued to provide case management as people’s needs did not decease, although many governmental institutions including hospitals and courts limited their work. Nevertheless, our priority was to ensure that people stay on ARVs and we brought some of our HIV positive participants to the AIDS center. One person initiated ARV with our help during this time. Other importants requests included accompanying to hospitals, to drug clinic, to a police station, recovery of documents, provision of additional clothes and food.
We also continued cooperation with mass media. We helped several journalists who worked on the stories about especially vulnerable groups to COVID, such as people who use drugs and sex workers. One of these stories, called “Thousands in methadone withdrawals. How Quarantine Affects Drug Users” published by Mediazona had gotten under the menacing look of the Head of the State Duma National Security Committee, deputy Piskarev. The deputy was outraged that in such difficult times, ARF provides services to such undeserving group as people who use drugs and blamed ARF for “drug propaganda” and serving the interests of the West, representing a threat to the national security. In several articles that followed the deputy’s outrage published by the Kremlin bot factory Riafan and some pro-government TV, the deputy informed that he had initiated a series of inspections into ARF activities by the prosecution and other executive bodies.
The attack on ARF from the deputy and federal media led to a couple very unpleasant consequences - we had to limit access to our website which makes us very vulnerable to sanctions. According to the current law and the spirit of the many new legislative initiatives any harm reduction information or even depicting of a person who uses drugs, not as a menace to the society can be interpreted as drug propaganda. Besides, a major harm reduction donor expressed reservations regarding extending support due to unfavourable spotlight in the Kremlin media. In response to the deputy attacks, ARF cooperated with Amnesty International who linked us with groups providing technical assistance on improving our security protocols. Once again, we received a lot of inspiring solidarity! ARF work has been featured in several supportive publications such as this large feature of our COVID work on Meduza care and so many people reached out to us to express support! Once again we were happy to witness that overall public debate on drugs and drug policy has shifted from stigma and myths to understanding, humane and supportive perspective and deeper understanding of drug policy realities. To compensate for the web-site closure we have extended our social media work and started a new podcast on drugs and harm reduction.
ARF continued to document challenges in access to health, cases of discrimination and human rights violations of people who use drugs. In addition to reporting to press, we have reported these problems to various state and international organs. In a letter to the Moscow City Health Department we indicated that refusal to provide drug treatment services puts individuals at risk of overdose deaths, infections and forces to criminal activities. We have wrote similar letters to the Ministry of Health and to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and to the Government of the Russian Federation suggesting to develop a response to vulnerable groups during COVID. In addition ARF continued its human rights documenting work and included information about COVID response into its reports to the UN human rights bodies such as Committee on Elimination of All forms of discrimination against women and the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression.
In conclusion. Covid has once again highlighted the severe vulnerabilities of our participants, most importantly absence of economic safety, absence of any meaningful support from the government structures in situation of economical crisis; absense of access to meaningful drug treatment and that drug services will be the first to be withdrawn in case of any next emergency such as COVID; absence of access and huge need for to mental health services combined with substance use/abuse counceling; lack of PWUD-friendly GBV services and lack of addressing GBV from harm reduction services providers such as ourselves. The COVID epidemic has once again proved that in the context of dictatorship and concervative ideologies in which we are operating the health authorities are not capable of protecting vulnerable citizens and its not in their interests. In such contexts, sustainability of health response should be built around investing in the communities and their resilient and lasting systems. The COVID crisis has highlighted the strengths and resourcefulness of our communities, including among people who use drugs regularly, recreationally but also with wider public that shares the ideals of humane and supportive drug policy. Covid challenged us to refresh services we already established and to look at the new challenges seeking for new responses. We are grateful to all our allies who inspired us with solidarity and strong commitment and to all of you who kept supporting our effort through the difficult times!
On Wednesday 15th July the GlobalGiving will give us an opportunity to raise for our new needs and challenges by matching donations on their July Bonus Day. They offer generous matches on larger donations:
a gift of $100-$499 will be matched at 15%
a gift of $500-$749 will be matched at 30%
a gift of $750-$1,000 will be matched at 50%.
This is an opportunity for us to start building on the lessons of COVID and develop our new directions of work: mental health support system, GBV algorithm, alternative financing through investing in community initiatives (still in exploration), volunteers education. Any smaller gifts and especially recurring donations will be greatly appreciated - such donations help us to plan a little bit better. So please wait for July 15 if you can share a larger gift with us, or make a donation now via our GlobalGiving page.
In solidarity,
ARF team
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