Despite 420 celebrations and growing support to legalize it, people of color continue to be incarcerated for marijuana and excluded from the cannabis industry.
Historically, drug policy has been written with racist intentions and fueled by hysteria over the war on drugs. This has led to racial disparities in sentencing for crack cocaine possession.
The impact of the “war on drugs” campaign in the ’70s and ’80s continues to the mass incarceration of Black and Brown people today.
While reports of "government-funded crack pipes" are false, harm reduction activists support adding them to safe smoking kits.
Opioid overdoses are rising during the COVID-19 pandemic and have disproportionately impacted Black people. Harm reduction programs can help mitigate the overdose epidemic.
