This is the second major report in the series. It provides a region-by-region update of key developments in harm reduction since the first Global State report was released in 2008.

It also explores several issues key to the response to drug-related harms worldwide, including increasing access to harm reduction in prisons and other places of detention, reaching people who use drugs with diagnosis, treatment and care for viral hepatitis and tuberculosis, preventing overdose-related mortality among people who use drugs, preventing and treating injecting-related bacterial infections, expanding the response to harms related to amphetamine use and addressing the current shortage of funds for harm reduction worldwide.

It is designed to be an advocacy and reference tool for a wide range of audiences, including international donor organisations, multilateral and bilateral agencies, non-governmental and community-based organisations, including organisations and groups of people who use drugs, researchers and the media.

The report is the result of collaboration between Harm Reduction International’s Public Health Research and Policy programme and harm reduction networks, researchers, and organisations of people who use drugs, whose input is essential to reflecting the situation around the world. In addition, chapters on key issues for harm reduction were contributed by experts from civil society, academia and multilateral agencies.