Sheila Vakharia PhD MSW

"The expansion of coca cultivation is a direct
driver of deforestation in the Andean valleys
and the Colombian Amazon." - Learn more about how illegal coca cultivation and the drug war are driving climate and environmental disaster www.reformrestorerecover.org/evidence

Baltimore media outlets may be exacerbating overdose crisis Experts say coverage in Baltimore has spread misinformation and steered a city struggling with the overdose crisis toward police crackdowns.

“The media oftentimes relinquishes its role in public education and public awareness, instead fanning the flames of fear and hysteria that can lead to support for harsher penalties and more stigmatization,” says @myharmreduction.bsky.social.

objectivejournalism.org/2025/11/balt...

Nabarun Dasgupta Combining scientific studies with community engagement to reduce deaths and other harms from drug use.

The HUGEST congratulations to my friend, colleague, hero @nabarund.bsky.social for being awarded a MacArthur Fellowship for his incredible harm reduction work and research. #MacFellow www.macfound.org/fellows/clas...

Hey Detroit! I will be doing a book talk on Tuesday, October 14th, alongside Kassandra Frederique and Valerie Kelley-Bonner. The event is 3-6 pm, and it is FREE. Simply register using the QR code on the flyer. Help spread the word!

SAVE THE DATE: Sept 25th 4:30-6pm EST

Join us for our September Drug Researchers' Roundtable with Drs. Cerda and Allen where they will discuss research on NYC's Overdose Prevention Centers and their impact on neighborhood conditions.

Register: bit.ly/Sep2025Roundtable

Trump’s Deadly Drug War Is Also Waged Through Funding Cuts While waging war in the Caribbean to "protect Americans," the administration is slashing lifesaving care for PWUD, as a new tracker details.

“They say they want to protect Americans from drugs, but their policies don’t match these words,” says Hanna Sharif-Kazemi as the administration talks up more drug-war strikes.

A new tracker helps quantify the damage to people who use drugs of domestic cuts, reports @tganeva.bsky.social:

Opinion | One Concrete Way to Make the Justice System Fairer

"Our existing system subjects hundreds of thousands of legally innocent people per year to the horrors of incarceration"

@bailproject.org on the importance (and effectiveness!) of ending cash bail for @nytopinion.nytimes.com👇

SAVE THE DATE: Sept 25th 4:30-6pm EST

Join us for our September Drug Researchers' Roundtable with Drs. Cerda and Allen where they will discuss research on NYC's Overdose Prevention Centers and their impact on neighborhood conditions.

Register: bit.ly/Sep2025Roundtable

New episode with @myharmreduction.bsky.social all about the victims of bad drug policy we don't hear about and how to face the attacks on harm reduction. Find it on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, etc.

open.spotify.com/episode/2Lzx...

🚨🗞️ JOURNALISTS: As the criminalization of homelessness runs rampant in DC & across the country, it's more important than ever to rely on data to get the story right.

Here are some useful resources that can help you to fight through misinformation 🧵

DC will be the testing ground. Next up could be your city. Where do they go? No one knows. The point is to disappear people without addressing the root causes- most notably, our housing affordability crisis.

The book cover for Read This When Things Fall Apart: Letters to Activists in Crisis, Edited by Kelly Hayes. The book cover features an artistic rendering of a person with long hair wading into a body of water at night in a wilderness.

Hey fam, my new book, Read This When Things Fall Apart, comes out in three months. That means now is the critical window for preorders, which help get books on shelves, in libraries, and into the hands of the people who need them most. www.pilsencommunitybooks.com/item/vCQt68D...

In recent years, the life-saving opioid overdose reversal medications (OORMs), naloxone and nalmefene, have been lumped into an ideological concept of harm reduction which has been used to advocate for policies that are incompatible with federal laws and inconsistent with this Administration's priorities.

What an insult to our harm reduction movement and elders who fought so hard for naloxone and fentanyl test strip access.

Check out the atrocious language in the latest letter from SAMHSA claiming these tools are "not harm reduction."

www.samhsa.gov/sites/defaul...

8/27 - Sheila Vakharia presents "The Harm Reduction Gap" w/ the Maryland Alliance for Sensible Drug Policy by Red Emma's Get tickets and support Red Emma's by becoming a member

The wonderful @myharmreduction.bsky.social will be at Red Emma's next month to talk about her book, "The Harm Reduction Gap." It's an excellent read, and I highly recommend attending the event.

Details:

withfriends.co/event/264441...

Sheila Vakharia presents "The Harm Reduction Gap" w/ the Maryland Alliance for Sensible Drug Policy This long-awaited book teaches how harm reduction can be a safety net for people with substance use disorders that our current addiction treatment rejects, abandons, and leaves behind.

SAVE THE DATE: August 27th at 7pm Baltimore

I'll be doing an in-person book talk and signing at Red Emma's. Register and bring a friend! I would love to see you there.

redemmas.org/events/sheil...

Exclusive: Trump team withholds $140 million budgeted for fentanyl fight Threats to $140 million in funds for public health departments battling fentanyl overdoses comes as some experts see the addiction safety net unraveling.

This administration has prioritized punishment, penalties, tariffs, and border enforcement in the name of our loved ones who died of overdose.

All while gutting the very programs & strategies that are saving lives, and cutting the research for solutions.
www.npr.org/2025/07/16/n...

Police in Ontario Increasingly Obstruct Harm Reduction Service Delivery Police surveillance and interference block life-saving care as the province becomes more hostile to harm reduction, our study shows.

"An increasingly hostile political and legal environment appears to be directly translating into greater police interference with health services," write Liam Michaud & co-authors of their new study, for which Ontario service users and providers were interviewed:

Wow I'm so so sorry!

Upended by Meth, Some Communities Are Paying Users to Quit

Appreciate this NYT coverage about Contingency Management, one of the most studied approaches to treating addiction- and one of our strongest tools to help people with stimulant use disorders.

Rewards, not punishment! www.nytimes.com/2025/07/16/h...

Harm Reduction Approaches with Adolescents Who Use Substances Amazon.com: Harm Reduction Approaches with Adolescents Who Use Substances: 9781032940847: Reiman, Amanda, Lessin, Barry: Books

People always ask me, "Sheila, but what about the kids?"

Now I can refer them to this great textbook.

Preorder your copy today!

It's by Amanda Reiman and Barry Lessin - "Harm Reduction Approaches with Adolescents who use Substances." www.amazon.com/Harm-Reducti...

Seeing some posts referring to Kilmar Abrego Garcia as being "kept safe" in jail. No one is safe in jail, fam. Incarceration strips years off people's lives and manufactures premature death. It's very important to understand this, especially now.

Feds Share Prison Contraband Data They May Not Have Thought Through A new USSC report awkwardly doesn't include synthetic cannabinoids, despite the so-called epidemic of these substances pouring into prisons.

"False positives for synthetic cannabinoids can be used to sanction prisoners and to fuel clicky headlines; accuracy doesn't matter unless the results would need to hold up in court. Which may explain why synthetic cannabinoids have awkwardly disappeared from federal sentencing data."

Prisons Need Their Own Post Offices, Not That We'll Ever Get Them Courts might give prison mail a three-day grace period, but they won't believe it took a month for your mail to make it to the post office.

"Courts might give prison mail a three-day grace period, but they won't believe it took a month for your mail to make it to the post office."

My heart is with my Iranian friends and their families. May everyone live.

Graph titled: Disciplinary write-ups are common and usually involve "minor" violations, but they almost always lead to harsh punishments

One of the cruelest, most unproductive disciplinary punishments prisons often turn to is taking away visitation

Here's the truth: Visitation has positive impacts for everyone – better health, reduced recidivism, and improvement in school. It should be a right, not a "privilege"

I was anti-war in 2003 when I was 21 and had no social media. Even then, I knew there were no WMDs. This time is no different.

Graph showing that more than 1 in 3 people in state prison were first arrested before their 16th birthday

More than 1 in 3 people in state prisons were first arrested before their 16th birthday. The criminalization of youth has life-altering consequences.

Shouldn't the US be investing in youth instead of locking them up?

Thanks for tuning in to our #CPDD2025 reads! Which article was your favorite? Consider publishing your next substance use related article in AJDAA!

Our harm reduction family continues to experience tremendous loss.

I am deeply saddened by the loss of Naomi Burke-Shyne and Peter Krykant.

Both made a tremendous impact in the short time they were with us. I wish we had more time with both.

May we be their continuation.

If you know (or are) an Early Career Researcher heading to #CPDD2025 on Saturday, be sure to swing by our panel to learn about different career paths! I'll talk about my journey to policy advocacy. Swing by Bayside Ballroom A at 2:45pm!