Participants from all five countries presented their national campaigns’ results and shared best practices that could be used during implementation of future anti-drug public campaigns.

Conference convened national delegations from Central Asia, representatives of the United Nations Development Programme, the European Commission, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), UNAIDS (Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS), TACIS, Europa House and other development agencies as well as EU Member states embassies.

In all five Central Asian countries, national public awareness campaigns were organized in 2008 in the framework of the “Drug abuse prevention campaign with the media” (MEDISSA) project.

Public campaigns featured theatre performances on anti-drug theme for schoolchildren, sport events (bicycle races, competitions etc), drawing contests, introduction of anti-drug lessons in schools, trainings for teachers of secondary schools family doctors and other social events and concert performances. In support to campaigns, promo aids were printed and widely distributed; radio spots and TV reels were broadcasted.

The objective of the information campaigns was to inform the general population of the risks of drug abuse and related HIV/AIDS infection.

In addition to public awareness campaigns, trainings for journalists were organized to raise awareness of their role in promoting the health and well being of vulnerable populations in Central Asia.

The project also created / reinforced within each Ministry of Health an Information Service on Substance Abuse to provide more in-depth information on drug and substance abuse to support access by drug users to public health services through a website, a hotline and a documentation service.

In Uzbekistan the Information Service on Substances Abuse has been set up in the framework of the media-campaign at the National Narcologic Center. All interested may visit the web-site at www.narcocenter.uz and receive a quality help of psychologists, narcologists and other specialists by calling “help line” at 150-04-50. Specialized literature, supplies for office equipment, subscription for periodicals have been provided for the Center. Total amount of the technical assistance to the Center is US$16,500.

To raise public awareness of the negative health and socioeconomic implications of drugs, a media campaign focused on dangers of drug abuse and its impact on HIV/AIDS could reduce both drug abuse and HIV infection rates.

The overall objective of the EU-UNDP CADAP Programme is foster a public health approach to drug demand and an interdiction approach to drug supply in line with the European Commission drug strategies.

CADAP is funded by the European Commission and implemented by UNDP.