{"id":2638,"date":"2026-08-06T10:12:24","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T09:12:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/welcome\/?p=2638"},"modified":"2026-08-18T10:41:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T09:41:08","slug":"do-you-know-what-harm-reduction-means","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/2026\/08\/06\/do-you-know-what-harm-reduction-means\/","title":{"rendered":"Do you know what harm reduction means?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What do you think the University\u2019s policy is towards drugs and alcohol? Do you know what harm reduction means in relation to drugs and alcohol?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And would you know where to go for support if you wanted to know how a certain substance might affect you, or if you wanted to make a change?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">These were all questions we asked students to get a better idea of what they understood about the University\u2019s approach to drugs and alcohol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It turns out many of you don\u2019t know the answers to these questions and unsurprisingly a large number of the students we asked, assumed that the University has a zero-tolerance policy approach to drugs. But we\u2019re here to tell you that that\u2019s not true.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">UWE has a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uwe.ac.uk\/life\/health-and-wellbeing\/stay-fit-and-healthy\/alcohol-and-drugs\">harm reduction approach to drugs including alcohol<\/a>, which means that whilst we don\u2019t endorse the use of these substances, we recognise that students may choose to do so. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Whilst we recommend you take some time to look at the policy, we&#8217;ve created this image summarising what&#8217;s in there. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"574\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/22\/2024\/09\/Policy-image-web-image-1024x574.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-3385\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/22\/2024\/09\/Policy-image-web-image-1024x574.png 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/22\/2024\/09\/Policy-image-web-image-300x168.png 300w, https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/22\/2024\/09\/Policy-image-web-image-768x430.png 768w, https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/22\/2024\/09\/Policy-image-web-image.png 1157w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 709px) 85vw, (max-width: 909px) 67vw, (max-width: 1362px) 62vw, 840px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Not knowing the University\u2019s policy could mean that you or your friends might be reluctant to ask for help or access support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That\u2019s why we run our harm reduction campaign all year round. To open up the conversation about drugs and alcohol and to make sure you know where you can go for support. Especially as we have Becky, our <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/welcome\/2023\/10\/31\/meet-your-specialist-drugs-and-alcohol-practitioner\/\">Specialist Drugs and Alcohol Practitioner<\/a>, who can support you with any aspect of substance use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The aim of the campaign is to get you to think about substance use, ask yourself questions and judge for yourself whether you need to be safer, make a change or get support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Because if know the risks you can reduce the harm, so when you see the posters around campus scan the QR code and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uwe.ac.uk\/life\/health-and-wellbeing\/stay-fit-and-healthy\/alcohol-and-drugs\">contact Becky<\/a> if you want to know more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8211; The Student Communications team<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What do you think the University\u2019s policy is towards drugs and alcohol? Do you know what harm reduction means in relation to drugs and alcohol? And would you know where to go for support if you wanted to know how a certain substance might affect you, or if you wanted to make a change? These &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/2026\/08\/06\/do-you-know-what-harm-reduction-means\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Do you know what harm reduction means?&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":52,"featured_media":2646,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":204,"footnotes":""},"categories":[204,431],"tags":[71,311,211,430],"class_list":["post-2638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-drugs-and-alcohol","category-welcome-2026","tag-drugs-and-alcohol","tag-drugs-and-alcohol-pratitioner","tag-drugs-awareness","tag-welcome-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/52"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2638"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3387,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2638\/revisions\/3387"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.uwe.ac.uk\/student\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}