Addressing the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on people who use drugs through health system innovation

People Who Use Drugs (PWUD) are facing increasing threats to their health and well-being due to COVID-19, drug poisoning deaths, houselessness, and other conditions. There is an urgent need for PWUD-centered responses to these emerging health threats. Using sense-making methods, asset mapping, and partner roundtable discussions, this project will document PWUD priorities for health interventions, identify community strengths that will help to implement these interventions, and determine what other resources are needed for implementation. The project builds on a two decade partnership between PWUD, the Boyle Street Community Services organization, and academics in Edmonton, Alberta. We will use community-based participatory research principles, with PWUD as core team members and leaders on the project. We expect the project to help PWUD community members with health promotion and health literacy, bring evidence into practice in an underserved setting, and build community and organizational capacity for patient-oriented research.