This special interest group (SIG) will focus on the intersection of illicit trade and public health. Communities worldwide face escalating harms from the illicit trade of psychoactive substances which fuels exposure to unsafe products, violence, exploitation, and widens health inequities. This SIG will investigate the root causes of these unintended impacts and work to identify solutions to overcome them.
The inaugural head of the SIG is Mark Tyndall, an infectious diseases and public health physician with extensive experience in harm reduction and drug policy.
Communities worldwide face escalating harms from the illicit trade of psychoactive substances, including alcohol, cannabis, nicotine, opioids, and other drugs, which fuels public exposure to unsafe products, violence, exploitation, and widens health inequities. Enforcement alone cannot address challenges created by: upstream policy gaps, fragmented mandates across public health, law enforcement, community systems, and limited shared data which leave populations vulnerable and responses reactive.
The Institute on Governance – a non-profit, non-partisan think tank in Ottawa Canada – will convene a multisectoral group of experts with a diverse range of knowledge and lived experience to tackle this complex challenge. Membership in the SIG is open to all GLEPHA members, and will explore the relationship between illicit trade of these substances and public health systems and indicators. The SIG will seek to mobilize cross‑sector expertise and real‑life experience from law enforcement, policy, public health experts, and others to advance research and develop practical guidance for navigating this intersection.
The inaugural head of the Special Interest Group will be Dr. Mark Tyndall who is an infectious diseases and public health physician with extensive experience in harm reduction and drug policy. He was a Professor of Medicine at the University of British Columbia and the Executive Director of the BC Center for Disease Control and deputy Provincial Health Officer for BC (2014-2018). More recently his focus has been on tobacco harm reduction with the release of his book, Vaping: Behind the Smoke and Fears.
For more information about this new Special Interest Group, or to be involved, please contact Rhonda Moore, rmoore@iog.ca