Drug Overdose Prevention Education (DOPE)

The deaths from heroin overdose are still on a steady decrease, that could be due to the quality of the heroin around or it could be due to the fact that drug users in Victoria have been getting accurate up to date information for the last 9 years from other drugs users through the VIVAIDS DOPE (drug overdose prevention education) Project.

The DOPE Project has been doing a good job; the project has yet again widened its focus to encompass Methamphetamine users which has been in response to the influx in media attention surrounding Ice use in our community, and the project is also doing workshops relating to poly drug use.

This year the project has also tried to widened its access to parts of the drug using community that the project hasn’t had access to in the past, like our community that live in rooming houses, and our comrades who are incarcerated in prisons such as MAP (Melbourne Assessment Prison).

We are confident that the changes that have been made to VIVAIDS/DOPE overdose education workshop 2006/07 have been widely accepted, and that VIVAIDS/ DOPE will continue to keep our finger on the pulse when it comes to changing drug trends. VIVAIDS is confident that our DOPE overdose education workshops, which have been ongoing since 1999-2000 have played an important part in preventing further unnecessary deaths from drug-related overdose.

Let’s hope the DOPE project keeps getting its messages out there to our community and keeps widening its access as well as it focus in future years to come.
Workshops Offered DOPE Contact
Under Construction
Jane Dicka

Drug Overdose Peer Educator
email: janedicka@vivaids.org.au
See also Prison Overdose Prevention (POP).
[© 2008 VIVAIDS Inc.]