119: Destigmatizing Harm Reduction, Mental Health, and Drug Use in Alberta with Danielle English

AnthroDish

We’ve spoken a bit this season about the drug poisoning crisis and how breweries can work to support their neighbours using substances, but with this affecting so many across Canada, but I wanted to come back to this topic with some more dimensions as well. My guest this week is Danielle English, who’s on to share more about harm reduction strategies and unpack the misconceptions and stigma that surround drug use and poverty.

Danielle is a harm reduction and mental health advocate, who comes from a background of lived and living experience. She does grass roots activism and lobbies for policy changes that will support people who use drugs. Danielle advocates for safe drug supplies and safe spaces for people who use drugs, and uses her own experiences navigating the mental health system to demonstrate the issues with the province of Alberta’s current resources.

In today’s conversation, Danielle explores the power, structures, and policies that are upholding harmful misconceptions about adequate and appropriate care for those who use drugs. Danielle provides resources, strategies, and lived experience knowledge to demonstrate how these are affecting many people throughout our communities, and how we can seek out resources and strategies to provide harm reduction to our own communities.

I will give a topic warning for this episode, as we discuss drug use, sexual abuse, and traumatic experiences that shape mental health. This interview is an incredibly important one for me, in how she speaks truth to so much fear and stigma around why people use drugs, and I encourage you to listen to her story.

Resources from Danielle:

• 4B Harm Reduction
• Moms Stop the Harm
• Drug Data Decoded
• DULF Compassion Club and Safe Supply Access