Rome Consensus in Asia and the Pacific
From: “Regional meeting of the Rome Consensus for Asia and Oceania”; Manila- Philippines, 27-29 September 2007
Asia: Back to the roots
I’m glad to be here in Asia, the first region in the world which addressed the drug problem in its first Red Cross Conference in Bangkok in 1922 and confirmed their engagement in the II Conference in Tokyo in 1924: it was a courageous demonstration of the Asian leaders discussing the vulnerabilities and problems affecting their communities and families, 85 years ago.
I would like to mention a quote of the decision adopted in 1922 which is based on the Humanitarian values of our Movement, on a RC/RC approach, which is still valid today:
“…..how the Red Cross Societies could help in the fight against opium and other drug abuses,
The I Conference of the Asian Red Cross Societies recommend that, in the countries where the abuse prevails, information in local languages is to be published about the risks of using such drugs and that such information is to be the first to be included in the community education programs run by the Red Cross National Societies, especially in the activities developed with the youth”
The Red Cross cares about vulnerable people. This is in fact one of the fundamental missions of the Red Cross: to advocate for the most vulnerable people. The ones who lack a voice. The Red Cross has shown a commitment throughout its history to address drug problems.
Before the current drug conventions were even written, in 1922 at the Bangkok Conference, the Red Cross was calling for sensible, humanitarian action to tackle drug use. Throughout this historic process, with renewed commitments in the International Conference of Istanbul in 1969 and of Geneva in 1986, the highest governance of the Red Cross Movement has systematically called on the governments to bring their moral and material support to actions fighting vulnerability.
Why the RC/RC should be involved on the fight of drug related suffering?
It is a good question my Dear friends: why drugs and not other humanitarian suffering?
Since its foundation in 1864, the Red Cross has rigorously followed its core Principle of Neutrality. This is the reason why, today, the Red Cross can work everywhere, in every community, regardless of racial, ideological, religious or political divides.
But the Red Cross has also another fundamental mission: the one of advocating for the most vulnerable people. Far from being contradictory, those two forces – neutrality and advocacy – if I may call them like this, meet at the point of alleviating human suffering. This is where the Red Cross finds its unique power of humanity
In the RC/RC Movement, we care about the 600 million people victims of conflicts and natural disasters every year, which is part of our mission, Principles and values;
However, the second major group of people suffering in the world is the drug users, who are stigmatized, discriminated and isolated from society.
Nowadays, more than 200 million people are drug users, worldwide; their marginalization affects their families, friends and communities and further hampers the civil society’s development.
The drug problem affects three major sectors of our society:
1. Local economy: Drugs hamper the development of public economy, causes brain drain and curtail public finance resources, producing more poverty and lack of opportunities,
2. Human security: Drugs increase violence, especially among young people and increase public health problems including the spread of HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis, putting pressure on the usually fragile health systems and generates more discrimination and isolation,
3. Governance and legitimacy: Narcotics criminalize sectors of society, foster corruption and money laundering, create instability of local authorities and spread corruption at all levels.
Our National Societies have a unique position. They are a bridge between society and governments.
As auxiliaries to public authorities we can make an important difference, first and foremost by being able to reach all groups and levels of society.
XXI Century: the humanitarian challenges
We in the Red Cross have always said that stigma kills. Indifference and discrimination kill more than the abuse of substances.
After more than 50 years with the Movement, I have never seen so much human suffering and stigmatization than in drugs. Sadly, a big share of this suffering is caused as much by the repressive policies as the substances themselves. This suffering does not end with the users only; it affects their immediate families and communities at large. The spread of AIDS is a sad indicator of the broad impact of drugs on our societies.
The reason why I am giving this background information is because at a time of disagreements – and there are many on drug policy – it is important to bring the discussion on public health policies and drug use down, to a more neutral and rational ground.
The global agenda goals of the Federation approved in Korea in 2005 are a clear reminder to the NS leaderships that it’s necessary to remain focused on the humanitarian suffering: I would like to call your attention especially to goals number three and four:
• Increase local community, civil society and Red Cross Red Crescent capacity to address the most urgent situations of vulnerability,
• Promote respect for diversity and human dignity, and reduce intolerance, discrimination and social exclusion.
Our Movement’s guiding principle is to fight human suffering and take every possible step to prevent it, regardless of race, religion and economic divides. Our unique power of humanity is to reach out to communities and issues that everybody else has neglected. But, inevitably, this power comes with special responsibilities.
The first responsibility is that the neutrality must become active where human suffering is out of control. Our Movement can be active on two fronts: Active on the ground, to provide care and support to drug victims and their families; but also active at the advocacy level to support the development and implementation of policies that help avoid more suffering.
The strength of this double engagement gives The Red Cross / Red Crescent immense possibilities to make a difference in the fight against drug suffering.
Discrimination and indifference kill more than the abuse of substances.
What to do? Our humanitarian actions
Basically these are the three main activities which could be implemented by the NS:
• Prevention and education
• Harm reduction activities for treatment and rehabilitation
• Advocacy and information
We have very good examples, which I wanted to mention now:
Prevention and education: Australian RC initiative
Save A Mate- SAM- began in Australia in 1999. The program was originally designed to address the disturbing rise in heroin overdoses that were occurring in young people. In the late nineties heroin overdoses became one of the largest killing causes of young people. SAM provides training, education, first aid services and health promotion initiatives that seek to build the skills and knowledge of young people to look after themselves and provide support to their peers. SAM delivers training to more than 7,000 young people and attends more than 200 youth events and festivals every year.
Harm reduction, treatment and rehabilitation:
China and more than 30 other NS in Europe, Asia, Middle East, Central Asia, and the Americas, have harm reduction programs which includes the identification of the vulnerabilities at the local level, regular contacts with the drug users, therapy and substitution treatment and psychological support and coaching: the NS also made a partnership with the authorities in order to provide a safe environment and to get the necessary authorizations and support.
A few years ago the Federation released its Guidelines for Harm Reduction Measures in the Fight against AIDS. These guidelines represent an important step in bringing more science and reason to the fight against drug use, which has been for too long obscured by ignorance and fear.
The Secretariat is now in the process to conduct a survey about Harm reduction activities in the NS.
A sophisticated range of public health and social instruments are available today to fight drug related suffering. It is not a problem of insufficient scientific knowledge or even of funding. Methadone, for example, is a very cheap and effective tool. The problem lies in political dogma. That is why we now have to take our efforts to the policy level. This is the next step of engagement that our Movement can take in the 21st century – to help develop a more humanitarian and rational drug policy that reduces suffering and avoids creating an additional one.
Villa Maraini , the Italian RC therapeutic community, I founded in 1976, has been providing training on harm reduction since 2004 to more than 25 teams from the NS; I want to invite all of you to visit us and to participate in these training courses.
Advocacy and information:
I would like to mention the example of the Council of Europe Convention for the Promotion of Public Health in Drug Control Advocacy Campaign.
The Council of Europe has taken an important initiative with regards to drug policy – The Convention on the Promotion of Public Health Policy in Drug Control. This represents a cornerstone of a global trend towards a new humanitarian approach to drug policy.
The Convention is a unique advocacy opportunity for the Red Cross/Red Crescent Movement, and for the Signatories of The Rome Consensus to join forces and efforts with governments and international organisations towards a public health oriented, efficient and humane drug policy.
The prominent role the Council of Europe plays in fostering the respect of human rights and the advance of humanitarian policies in the world endows this initiative with global breath and relevance.
I have visited many times Strasbourg in the past, to discuss with the MP members of the Council of Europe this important issue and I’m glad to inform you that the draft we wrote together with Mr. Paul Flynn, the Rapporteur of the Health Commission, was approved in June 2007 with the support of 29 NS members of the Rome Consensus and is now going to be submitted to the General session at the beginning of October: after that, we expect it to be approved by the ministers of Europe at the end of the year.
The Rome Consensus: an initiative of the RC/RC National Societies
The Rome Consensus for a Humanitarian Drug Policy was first signed in December 2005 during the High Level Seminar ‘Bridging the Gap between Public Health and Drug Policy’ organised by the Italian Red Cross and The Senlis Council.
In March 2007, the Consensus’ commitment was strengthened and expanded on the occasion of the International Think Tank on Drugs hosted by the Italian Red Cross and supported by the Senlis Council.
The Consensus now commits 50 National Societies of Red Cross and Red Crescent from Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, Central and South- East Asia.
The Rome Consensus is a unique opportunity to establish a new commitment to a humanitarian drug policy based on reason and compassion that generates action, free from ideology, force, stigmatization and discrimination.
As a chairman of the Rome Consensus leaders group, I’m confident in our strengths, in our people, our skills, our image and visibility, the respect and love for our Emblems, the commitment to our Principles and to the humanitarian values: I hope that all the leaders present in Manila today accept to endorse the Rome Consensus declaration 2007; my personal goal is to reach 100 NS signatories of the Rome Consensus until the end of the year.
Our Movement has a strategic duty to respect difference and promote tolerance and fight intolerance. I am not suggesting that we should show passive compassion and resignation towards use and abuse of drugs.
But between negative judgment based on fear and ignorance and laisser faire, we must find a new way, which is of active compassion, of listening, treating and advocating for policies that prevent more suffering.
During the International RC/RC Conference in Geneva in November 2007 we will run a workshop on “Humanitarian and public health aspects of substance abuse” with the objective to present the result of the Rome Consensus work. I would like to invite all of you to take part in this event and to promote it among other NS.
Acknowledgements
I want to thank the Philippines RC for accepting to host this important meeting and to provide all the necessary support and arrangements: I especially want to express my gratitude to the Chairman, Honorable Richard Gordon, to the Secretary General Corazon Alma de Leon and to Gwendolyn Pang, focal point International Relations, their team and the volunteers
Many, many thanks to the National Societies which accepted the invitation to participate in this regional meeting.
Finally I want to say thank you very much to our friends of the Senlis Council, Emmanuel Reinert, Diana and Katie for their unconditional support to the Rome Consensus initiatives since 2005: this is a clear demonstration that operational alliances work out when everyone involved has a clear understanding of their priorities and what they want to achieve.
Final Remarks
Evidently the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement is still learning, sometimes hesitating, but its fundamental mission of ‘Spreading the light of science and the warmth of human sympathy’ always shows us the way forward.
The Red Cross, but also civil society, always go where human progress and sympathy calls them.
When governments fail to follow such path we will keep on going forward, bringing the warmth of human sympathy to the most vulnerable. Drug policy and the strategy for pain relief has lacked for too long this warmth.
National governments and the international community must catch up with this progress at the grass root level and acknowledge that the time for a humanitarian drug policy has come. In a globalized world, we all have to mobilize our power of humanity in order to offer sustainable and systematic solutions to a problem as wide-reaching as drugs.
This meeting in Manila is the occasion to propose new ideas for our Movement to take drug policy as a strategic issue to be dealt with at all the levels of action by our National Societies.
Together, only together, we can make a difference. The Rome Consensus is your opportunity to make this difference.
Thank you very much