ArticleThe International journal on drug policy2020
COVID-19 and the health of people who use drugs: What is and what could be?
Article in The International journal on drug policy, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 48 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
48 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 91 citations in OpenAlex.
- Understanding the Impacts of Novel Coronavirus Outbreaks on People Who Use Drugs: A Systematic Review to Inform Practice and Drug Policy Responses to COVID-19.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Pooled it
- The impact of COVID-19 on people who inject drugs in New York City: increased risk and decreased access to services.Harm reduction journal · 2021Trial
- Identifying Demographic Predictors of Increased Nonfatal Opioid Overdose Risk Among New York State Medicaid Enrollees After the COVID-19 Pandemic: An Analysis of Heterogeneous Treatment Effects.Epidemiology (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2026Article
- Lessons from COVID-19 for improving delivery of medications for opioid use disorder in future pandemic events: results from a Puerto Rico Delphi consensus panel.Harm reduction journal · 2026Article
- "From an HCV and HIV point of view, it's been remarkable": A qualitative study about using prescribed safer supply to support people who use drugs along the HIV and HCV prevention and treatment cascades in Ontario, Canada.Journal of the International AIDS Society · 2025Article
- Drug treatment and support service utilization amidst the COVID-19 pandemic among people who inject drugs in Baltimore, Maryland: An interrupted time-series analysis, 2015-2022.The International journal on drug policy · 2025Article
- Navigating the COVID-19 Risk Environment, Overdose Prevention, and Self Care Practices of People Who Use Illicit Opioids in New York City.Substance use & misuse · 2025Article
- A social network analysis approach to assess COVID19-related disruption to substance use treatment and informal social interactions among people who use drugs in Scotland.Addiction science & clinical practice · 2024Article
- Volatile drug use and overdose during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States.The International journal on drug policy · 2024Article
- Evaluating the prevalence of current hepatitis C infection and treatment among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who inject drugs in Australia: The ETHOS engage study.Drug and alcohol review · 2023Observational
- Residence in urban or rural counties in relation to opioid overdose mortality among Kentucky hospitalizations before and during the COVID-19 pandemic.The International journal on drug policy · 2023Article
- Building an inpatient addiction medicine consult service in Sudbury, Canada: preliminary data and lessons learned in the era of COVID-19.Substance abuse treatment, prevention, and policy · 2023Observational
- "It's just a perfect storm": Exploring the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on overdose risk in British Columbia from the perspectives of people who use substances.BMC public health · 2023Article
- Impact of COVID-19 & Response Measures on HIV-HCV Prevention Services and Social Determinants in People Who Inject Drugs in 13 Sites with Recent HIV Outbreaks in Europe, North America and Israel.AIDS and behavior · 2023Article
- "You'll come in and dose even in a global pandemic": A qualitative study of adaptive opioid agonist treatment provision during the COVID-19 pandemic.The International journal on drug policy · 2023Article
- Palliative care for people who use drugs during communicable disease epidemics and pandemics: A scoping review on access, policies, and programs and guidelines.Palliative medicine · 2023Article
- Increased solitary drug use during COVID-19: An unintended consequence of social distancing.The International journal on drug policy · 2023Article
- Trends in deaths following drug use in England before, during, and after the COVID-19 lockdowns.Frontiers in public health · 2023Article
- Everywhere and for everyone: proportionate universalism as a framework for equitable access to community drug checking.Harm reduction journal · 2022Article
- Methadone and buprenorphine-related deaths among people prescribed and not prescribed Opioid Agonist Therapy during the COVID-19 pandemic in England.The International journal on drug policy · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has changed the world as we know it, and continues to do so. How COVID-19 affects people who use drugs, the environments in which they live, and capacities of response, warrants immediate attention. This special issue begins to map how COVID-19 is altering the health of people who use drugs, including in relation to patterns of drug use, service responses, harms that may relate to drug use, interventions to reduce risk of harms, COVID-19 health, and drug policies. We emphasise the need to envisage COVID-19 and its effects as a matter of intersecting 'complex adaptive systems': that is, the impacts of COVID-19 extend beyond the virus and related illness conditions to encompass multiple social, cultural, economic, policy and political effects; and these affect the health of people who use drugs directly as well as indirectly by altering the risk and enabling environments in which they live. We synthesize emergent evidence on the impact of COVID-19 on the health of people who use drugs. A key concern we identify is how to sustain policy and service delivery improvements prompted by COVID-19. We need to maintain an ethos of emergent adaptation and experimentation towards the creation of safer environments in relation to the health of people who use drugs.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.