Harm Reduction in European Prisons: Availability and Current Gaps. Civil Society Monitoring of Harm Reduction in Europe 2025
Harm Reduction in European Prisons: Availability and Current Gaps. Civil Society Monitoring of Harm Reduction in Europe 2025
People do not stop using drugs at the prison gate, and harm reduction should not stop there either. Yet new findings from the C-EHRN Monitoring 2025 mini-report on prisons show that access to essential harm reduction services in European prisons remains limited, uneven, and far behind what is available in the general community.
Drawing on data from 38 European cities with prisons, the report reveals major gaps in prison-based harm reduction. While opioid agonist treatment (OAT) and hepatitis C testing are more commonly available, life-saving interventions such as naloxone distribution and needle and syringe programmes (NSP) remain absent in most cities. Only 1 out of 38 cities reported access to all four key harm reduction services in prison. (Correlation, Niederlande, 28.05.2026)