More evidence or stronger political will: exploring the feasibility of needle and syringe programs in Ukrainian prisons [electronic resourse]

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dc.contributor.authorDmitrieva, Alexandra en_US
dc.contributor.authorStepanov, Vladimir en_US
dc.contributor.authorSvyrydova, Kateryna en_US
dc.contributor.authorLukash, Ievgeniia Galyna en_US
dc.contributor.authorDoltu, Svetlana en_US
dc.contributor.authorGolichenko, Mikhail en_US
dc.contributor.authorKalivoshko, Valeriy en_US
dc.contributor.authorKhanyukov, Evgeniy en_US
dc.contributor.authorKosmukhamedova, Zhannat en_US
dc.contributor.authorTorkunov, Oleh en_US
dc.contributor.authorZagrebelnyi, Oleksii en_US
dc.date.accessioned2025-01-14T08:30:36Z
dc.date.available2025-01-14T08:30:36Z
dc.date.issued2021
dc.description.abstractIntroduction: In 2007, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended for prison authorities to introduce prison needle and syringe programs (PNSP) if they have any evidence that injecting drug use is taking place in prisons. This article presents descriptive evidence that injecting drug use takes place in Ukrainian prisons, it discusses how (denial of ) access to injection equipment is regulated in the current system and what changes should be considered in order to implement PNSP. Background: Ukrainian prisons still live by the laws and policies adopted in the Soviet Union. Besides laws and regulations, these legacies are replicated through the organization and infrastructure of the prison’s physical space, and through "carceral collectivism" as a specific form of living and behaving. Inviolability of the prison order over time helps the prison staff to normalize and routinely rationalize punishment enforcement as a power "over" prisoners, but not a power "for" achieving a specific goal. Methods: The Participatory Action Research approach was used as a way of involving different actors in the study’s working group and research process. The data were gathered through 160 semi-structured interviews with prison health care workers, guards, people who inject drugs (PWID) who served one or several terms and other informants. Results: The "expertise" in drug use among prisoners demonstrated by prison staff tells us two things—they admit that injecting use takes place in prisons, and that the surveillance of prisoner behavior has been carried out constantly since the very beginning as a core function of control. The communal living conditions and prison collectivism may not only produce and reproduce a criminal subculture but, using the same mechanisms, produce and reproduce drug use in prison. The "political will" incorporated into prison laws and policies is essential for the revision of outdated legacies and making PNSP implementation feasible. Conclusion: PNSP implementation is not just a question of having evidence of injecting drug use in the hands of prison authorities. For PNSP to be feasible in the prison environment, there is a need for specific changes to transition from one historical period and political leadership to another. And, thus, to make PNSP work requires making power work for change, and not just for reproducing the power itself. en_US
dc.identifier.citationMore evidence or stronger political will: exploring the feasibility of needle and syringe programs in Ukrainian prisons [electronic resourse] / Dmitrieva A., Stepanov V., Svyrydova K., Lukash I.-G., Doltu S., Golichenko M., Kalivoshko V., Khanyukov E., Kosmukhamedova Z., Torkunov O., Zagrebelnyi O. // Harm reduction journal. - 2021. - Vol. 18, Issue 1. - Article number 10. - https://doi.org/10.1186/s12954-020-00459-z en_US
dc.identifier.issn1477-7517
dc.identifier.urihttps://doi.org/10.1186/s12954-020-00459-z
dc.identifier.urihttps://ekmair.ukma.edu.ua/handle/123456789/33140
dc.language.isoen en_US
dc.relation.sourceHarm reduction journal en_US
dc.statusfirst published en_US
dc.subjectcarceral collectivism en_US
dc.subjectinjecting drug use en_US
dc.subjectPost-Soviet prison en_US
dc.subjectSoviet legacies en_US
dc.subjectarticle en_US
dc.titleMore evidence or stronger political will: exploring the feasibility of needle and syringe programs in Ukrainian prisons [electronic resourse] en_US
dc.typeArticle en_US
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