The Heart of It: Edith Springer, Dignity, Respect & Love

“Participants deserve our attention and good will; they don’t have to EARN it.” - Edith Springer

Edith Springer was a social worker, harm reduction educator, and a former drug user herself. She is a co-founder of the harm reduction movement. Edith Springer was the clinical director of the New York Peer AIDS Education Coalition (NYPAEC). Sources: 1, 2, 3

Springer and her educators taught AIDS prevention in a neutral fashion, without judging or parenting their clients. "People need to know they are deserving of respect, dignity, and support," she said. A social worker by training, she discovered in dealing with her own drug use more than a decade ago how brutal society could be to drug users. "I was treated like garbage when I looked for help. With harm reduction, we believe in the intelligence and expertise of clients to make decisions in their own lives."

“Harm reduction isn't a higher power, it isn't God, but it is a spiritual power -- love, respect and dignity." - Edith Springer

This life saving work that we often associate with police or health departments was actually developed first by people who use drugs. This is important. Naloxone Distribution, Fentanyl testing strips, syringe access, these are all interventions that were created by people who use drugs in order to save and improve one another’s lives. Because contrary to what we are often told, people who use drugs value their lives and the lives of their community. 

The founders of harm reduction understood that to truly reduce harm we must address the systemic harms that are trickling down into individual lives. We must shift power and resources to those who are most in need and who know the most from lived experience. People who use drugs are the leaders of our work to end overdose, so we ought not villainize but instead listen and learn from them.