Preventing transitions into injection drug use: A call for gender-responsive upstream prevention.
In 2017, there were large increases (260-500%) in overdose deaths among women in the United States across age groups (30-64 years and 55-64 years). In addition, U.S. women who inject drugs (WWID) are at increased risk for substance use-related disease transmission, bacterial infections, as well as sexual and physical violence compared to men who inject drugs. Relatedly, women face unique access barriers to substance use-related services, such as stigma and low coverage of gender-specific drug use-related services. Despite these heightened risks experienced by WWID, interventions specifically tailored to preventing women from transitioning into injection drug use have not been developed to date. As such, we advocate for the development of gender-responsive programs to prevent injection drug use initiation. This is critical to ensuring a comprehensive approach to preventing injection drug use initiation among those populations at highest risk of injection-related morbidity and mortality.
['Meyers|Stephanie A|SA|', 'Smith|Laramie R|LR|', 'Werb|Dan|D|']
D000328:Adult D005260:Female D015658:HIV Infections D006801:Humans D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations D012725:Sexual Behavior D015819:Substance Abuse, Intravenous D019966:Substance-Related Disorders D014481:United States
Prevention Injection drug use Gender People who use drugs Women who use drugs