Meeting People Where They Are

Advancing the success of Harm Reduction treatment, policy, and practice across New York State.

2026 Conference Announcement

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WHO WE ARE

The New York State Harm Reduction Association (NYSHRA) was formed out of the understanding that providers and advocates of harm reduction in New York State could make real gains with a unified voice, representation in policy-making spaces, and opportunities to expand best practices through training and education. We are now a powerful collective of prominent organizations who have come together to achieve our mission through:

ADVOCACY & PUBLIC POLICY

COMMUNITY

TRAINING & EDUCATION

RESEARCH

WHAT IS HARM REDUCTION?

Harm reduction is a set of practical strategies and ideas aimed at reducing negative consequences associated with drug use. Harm Reduction is also a movement for social justice built on a belief in, and respect for, the rights of people who use drugs.

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PRINCIPLES OF HARM REDUCTION

Harm reduction incorporates a spectrum of strategies that includes safer use, managed use, abstinence, meeting people who use drugs where they’re at, and addressing social and structural conditions.

NO JUDGEMENT

Calls for the non-judgmental, non-coercive provision of services and resources to people who use drugs and the communities in which they live in order to assist them in reducing attendant harm

ONE SIZE DOES NOT FIT ALL

Understands drug use as a complex, multi-faceted phenomenon that encompasses a continuum of behaviors from severe use to total abstinence, and acknowledges that some ways of using drugs are clearly safer than others

SELF-EMPOWERMENT

Affirms people who use drugs (PWUD) themselves as the primary agents of reducing the harms of their drug use and seeks to empower PWUD to share information and support each other in strategies which meet their actual conditions of use

SELF-ADVOCACY

Ensures that people who use drugs and those with a history of drug use routinely have a real voice in the creation of programs and policies designed to serve them

SOCIAL JUSTICE

Recognizes that the realities of poverty, class, racism, social isolation, past trauma, sex-based discrimination, and other social inequalities affect both people’s vulnerability to and capacity for effectively dealing with drug-related harm

REAL WORLD PERSPECTIVE

Accepts, for better or worse, that licit and illicit drug use is part of our world and chooses to work to minimize its harmful effects rather than simply ignore or condemn them