Today, as the United Nations marks the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, more than 400 leading HIV, public health, and human rights organizations petitioned the UN to promote policies that protect the human rights of people who use drugs. Across the globe, efforts to control the use and trafficking of drugs are denying drug users vital services aimed at preventing HIV and AIDS.

The petition, which was endorsed by 442 organizations in 78 countries, was sent to Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, UNAIDS Executive Director Peter Piot, UN Office on Drugs and Crime Director Antonio Costa, and others. The letter urges the UN to "speak with one voice" and address drug use through public health measures rather than through punitive policies.

Ten years ago, UN member states agreed to a utopian plan under the motto of: Drug-Free World, We Can Do It. The results of this commitment are bleak: widely available needle exchange and substitution treatment continue to be an exception rather than a rule in countries where drug users comprise significant numbers of those infected with HIV; prisons continue to be filled with people incarcerated for personal possession; and international funding is wasted on ill-conceived strategies to curb drug production. In many developing countries, no evidence-based treatments exist for people who are dependent on drugs. Instead, drug users are locked up in prison-like facilities, sometimes indefinitely.

Member states often mark the UN-sponsored anti-drug day with drug seizures, executions, arrests, and imprisonment of alleged drug users to showcase their drug control efforts. However, this year, the Secretary-General issued a statement on June 24 saying that "no one should be stigmatized or discriminated against because of their dependence on drugs."

OSI's Global Drug Policy Program is encouraging people worldwide to document failures of national drug policies and to post them on YouTube. The program will offer awards to the five top films and will invite the filmmakers to take part in the International Harm Reduction Association conference in Thailand in 2009. Further details will be available shortly.