A congressional attempt yesterday to cast doubt on the legitimacy of harm reduction instead demonstrated the breadth of the support for and science behind this approach. At the same time, it revealed that the drug warriors feel very threatened by the work of the Alliance – which means we are doing a great job!

The forum was a House Drug Policy Subcommittee hearing convened by drug warrior Mark Souder, the Congressman from Indiana who calls harm reduction an "ideological position" not based on science.  The purpose of the hearing was to discuss whether harm reduction is a legitimate approach – a question that, given the vast amount of science saying harm reduction works, made for needless misuse of the time of both the Members of Congress and the witnesses who testified.  The pre-existing bias against harm reduction was evident even in the title of the hearing, "Harm Reduction or Harm Maintenance: Is There Such a Thing as Safe Drug Abuse?" To address the question, Rep. Souder assembled a panel that included Andrea Barthwell – the former Office of National Drug Control Policy deputy director and current promoter of an anti-marijuana lobbying effort in Illinois thinly disguised as education – as well as several representatives from predominantly Muslim countries who talked about their efforts to implement faith-based programs to reduce drug use. The connection of this issue to the topic of the hearing was not readily apparent.

Irrelevant testimony aside, the hearing pitted ambiguous statistics and rhetoric from the drug warriors against concrete, scientific evidence of the success of harm reduction strategies – in particular needle exchange programs – by health experts and the Baltimore City Health Commissioner. Consequently, harm reduction was able to hold its ground with little difficulty.

In addition to re-establishing the legitimacy of harm reduction, the hearing revealed that the Alliance has made a big impression on the drug war crusaders. Their testimony was full of attacks that mentioned the Drug Policy Alliance by name, and Rep. Souder even went so far as to single out the two Alliance board members who were testifying at the hearing in his opening statement. This can only mean one thing: we are making a big impact, and they are really worried.

We will continue to put pressure on Congress to do what both common sense and evidence dictate: support harm reduction. This hearing may mark the beginning of an effort by Rep. Souder and the rest of the drug warriors to stop federal funding for harm reduction programs, but they will have an uphill battle without science on their side.