At the Iowa Harm Reduction Coalition, we have one goal: meeting Iowans where they’re at.
It’s a simple mission, but one that has had profound implications.
Our fellow Iowans are falling through the cracks, left to fend for themselves amid the growing opioid, meth, injection drug use, HIV, and hepatitis C epidemics. IHRC is trying, day in and day out, to fill that void. We are doing it in ways big and small, one person at a time.
100 to 1
What has IHRC done for Iowans this year?
168
lives saved with naloxone
1250
individual Iowans served
1400
naloxone rescue kits distributed to prevent overdose
100
point of contact HIV & Hepatitis C test administered
20%
of patients tested identified as Hepatitis C positive and routed to care
92,000
safer injections
110
Iowans connected to rapid rehousing programs
650+
individuals receiving harm reduction education and training
4
bills advanced in the Iowa legislature to save lives
What will you help us do next?
Join us today. Your support will make a difference. Your support will save lives.
“We can’t thank you enough for what you do for us. We feel so much safer. Having clean supplies and naloxone is such a big deal and one of our most important concerns and we’d never feel as safe as we do if it weren’t for what you do for us and everyone else. What IHRC does is literally the most generous, realistic, and actually helpful approach to a situation like this [IV drug use] that I’ve ever encountered. I want you to know how appreciative I am and I’m sure my feelings are shared by others. It would be nice if all the stuff we need could be easily available and accessible and reasonably affordable for us average people. It would be nice if people didn’t need to go well out of their way to help as many people as they possibly can at their own expense and personal time. Until then, I’ll always be thankful and realize how lucky I am that IHRC is around.”
– IHRC participant and current IV drug user from Cedar Rapids
“IHRC saves lives and prevents more harm in our community, but it also helps me to turn my life around and do something positive. I reversed over twenty overdoses with IHRC’s naloxone kits. That’s a really good feeling, and makes me feel like maybe my life is worth something. It makes me think I can become a more productive member of my community.”
– IHRC participant and current IV drug user from Cedar Rapids
At IHRC we are saving lives, preventing disease, building community and bridging divides.
But we can’t do it without your help. Become a sustaining member of IHRC. With your support we will be able to meet the dual crisis of the opioid and intravenous drug use epidemics head on, giving Iowa it’s best chance to turn the tide before it’s too late.
Become one of our first 100 sustaining members and you will allow IHRC to not only save lives, but change them.
Our organization has built trust and connections with a population that is often skeptical of and invisible to our existing medical and public health infrastructure. We are in a unique position to help, but we can’t do it alone.
Your support will help us get more overdose reversal medicine to more Iowans. This will save lives.
Your support helps us connect more homeless Iowans with housing. This will change lives.
Your support helps us to test more Iowans for Hepatitis C and HIV and link them into care. This will allow us to finally effectively combat these diseases in our state.
Your support helps us to continue our legislative advocacy and education initiatives. This will allow Iowa to establish syringe service programs, far and away the single most effective method for preventing the spread of HIV and Hepatitis C, in addition to the other dangerous and deadly sequelae associated with syringe reuse.
Your support helps us to expand our fentanyl contaminant testing program. This will save lives and protect our police, firefighters and first responders.
Deaths from opioid overdoses in Iowa have increased 500% in the last decade, but no other organization in Iowa, not at the city, county or state level has taken meaningful steps to get the overdose reversal medication, naloxone, into the hands of the people who need it most.
IHRC has. We crafted a standing order with the Iowa Board of Pharmacy to allow us to distribute this antidote and train people to use it.
In the last 8 months alone, we have distributed over 5000 doses of naloxone directly to the Iowans most at risk and most in need. Most importantly: our kits our free. We don’t believe anyone should be priced out at a second chance.
This approach has been proven to work in other states, and it’s working here in Iowa. In less than 1 year, we have over 100 confirmed overdose reversals as the direct result of getting this life saving medicine out into our community. That’s 100 sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, friends and fellow Iowans who will remain a part of our communities. 100 families who won’t have to deal with an unimaginable loss.
Overdose prevention is only one part of the work we do at IHRC.
In the last year we have trained volunteers from around the state on how to effectively perform outreach using the harm reduction model.
In the last year we have educated law enforcement agencies, substance use treatment centers and community organizations from around the state on how to administer naloxone, in addition to supplying them with this life saving medicine.
In the last year we have advocated: We have been a constant presence at the State House in Des Moines, building connections and relationships to move Iowa toward adopting policies that can help blunt the rising opioid and IV drug use epidemics.
IHRC is working everyday, at every level. We are building relationships with community, public health and law enforcement organizations. We are changing minds and turning opponents into allies in legislative districts across the date. But most importantly, we are taking things one person at a time, letting them know that they are seen. That there are people out there who care. IHRC: meeting people where they are at.
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