 Thank you. Our next speaker is Naro Ao. Naro is from Nagaland, India. She's a woman living with HIV and a drug user. She started in the field of HIV and drugs in May 2005, engaging in outreach activities with both drug users and community of people living with HIV in her hometown. She also worked with APN plus in the capacity of women coordinator. She has represented women who use drugs from Asia in various national and regional platform, highlighting the specific issues faced by women who use drugs in Asia and advocated for these issues to be addressed. Currently, she sits in the executive board of UNPUT, the Asian Network of People Who Use Drugs. Naro. Thank you, Michelle, for the introduction. Good morning, everyone. I would like to start with some of the achievements made by people who use drugs in this movement. The involvement of people who use drugs in advocacy and implementation has not resulted in many positive change in many areas related to harm reduction. Example, distribution of needle and syringe is acceptable today because of the involvement of us in the advocacy. Another example is, it's from India, which I wanted to highlight, community has first initiated Nalaxon in harm reduction program without any external support because it saved lives. So there was no funding, but the peers, we know that we have to save our friends' life and that's how it initiated among the peers and this was used as an evidence for advocacy and now government of India is providing Nalaxon in all the government hospitals, which is a great achievement and this is this is achieved because of the involvement of drug users in the advocacy and programming and similarly, there are other very good examples from across the country's globally of issues being able to address by people who use drugs, although there is a lot needs to be done, but still something has been achieved because of the involvement. Evidence has also shown that community-led or peer-led intervention has resulted in many best practices and innovative ways. It is effective because it involves trust and we solve our problem out of the box, thinking out of the box. The journey of drug users movement started at a very grassroots level. If you study a drug user's life, the journey started at a very grassroots level at the implementation as a peer educator mostly or an outreach worker and slowly made it to a higher level, I mean, involving in policy dialogues and all. And in this journey, in this journey we left, we've missed the women, a population, which is the women who use drugs. If you look into the leadership role that people who use drugs are playing in Asian context, how many women activists we have in Asia? Who are drug users? It's almost 20 years and it's almost nil. And why is harm reduction program not gender-sensitive and why hasn't it been not addressed still now? It's because of lack of involvement. So, yes, there has been achievement because of the involvement of people who use drugs, but in one area, a big hall has been left out. And so, beginning with that, I want to share some challenges faced by women who use drugs in our region. Number one is many people say that it's hidden or not, it's hidden and invisible. No, we are visible. We are not hidden. The only thing is we are invisible to others, to people. When harm reduction implementation started, implementation of harm reduction program started, it is for the people who use drugs. And maybe the women were left behind because of number one, the double stigma. It is not easy to come out as a drug user. I'm a drug user and for me it was very difficult. Coming out in public and saying that I am HIV positive was much, much easier for me than saying I'm a drug user. So in that situation, unless there are certain things that certain services or activities which can attract women who use drugs besides just needle and syringe, providing needle and syringe or condoms or referral services for OISD and other treatment, there is nothing and that's why what is the use of coming out. I don't want to come out. I just want to be secure in my own place. So it's not about hidden or invisible. We are very much there. It's just that it's time we need to be, we are there so it's time people need to see us. As I said, harm reduction services were provided to all people who use drugs, irrespective of genders, young or all. But in the process, in the process a lot of capacities have been built of people who use drugs. And in that area of capacity building, women who use drugs were overlooked. They were never there. And they were overlooked in terms of implementation, at the implementation level in terms of representation, in terms of taking leadership role. And that is why today, even after almost 20 years of HIV and drug use movement in our region, our region still lack women specific or gender specific program in harm reduction. Our involvement was not given importance and that is why women in leadership role as an activist or an advocate is almost nil in our region. Programs are designed to find things from research and experts. And from research and expert brings this to the designing level. And since the women who use drugs were not involved at the designing level, maybe that is one reason why we don't have services that we need in the existing harm reduction program. But very lately the involvement of women who use drugs is felt and platform is many areas. But again when it comes to investment, nobody wants to invest in us. Number one example is how many women from Asia are here in this harm reduction conference when this conference, international conference is happening here in Asia. We have women activists in the countries where why aren't they there here? I mean in this conference. I don't know why donors or investors or whoever, I don't know why, what is the reason behind not wanting to invest in us. But that is one. I was actually expecting a lot of women at least from this part of the world because it's happening here. But it's very sad to see that it's very, very, very few. This shouldn't be happening. It should be more than this but that's one example. I was once told that number of women who use drugs is very less as compared to men. So designing a program just for a few numbers is not cost effective. Seriously. I believe we are all in this movement in order to save lives and creating an environment where human rights of people who use drugs are respected. So women who use drugs are not human because we are not human because we are few in numbers compared to men. Whether it is one or thousands or millions, it is about human lives not about numbers. So I appeal to everyone here that please open your eyes because we are very much alive and present among you. Start recognizing the issues that we bring and invest on us too. Otherwise tomorrow no matter how many good things you have done, how many positive things you have been able to make, I mean you have been able to contribute, you will still question your own accountability in this movement by leaving us behind. If you leave us behind you will question your own accountability. And also I agree with Rajiv that it is never too late to start. At least for us women who use drugs. So we as women who use drugs will be expecting a lot of positive things to bring after this conference which can definitely be a camp changer in this movement. Thank you. Thank you very much Narrow message, very clear. Questions and comments from the audience? Please. Can you pass the microphone here? Hi. I worked with a lot of women when I was working in Luton back in London. Sorry my name is Mags, I'm the coordinator for EuroInput. And one of the things I found amongst the women from the Asian populations was the dreadful stigma that they had to live with and the fear in coming out as a woman, as an Asian woman who was using drugs. And one of the innovative ideas that we came up with in order to be able to attract the women to our service was putting on health days. And we would for example advertise the fact that we would be having a sexual health and family planning day. And behind that we would actually be having sessions that were linked to sexual abuse or other types of abuse which might be some of the underlying reasons why the women were using drugs in the first place and then we'd be able to sign post them on for further support etc etc. Because we found that in order for us to be able to provide interventions we had to do it in secret of their husbands and their communities. So I just wanted to share that with you really just for ideas for the future and good luck with it. Thank you for the SS. It's true as an Asian woman coming out as a drug user. It's not easy. It's seriously not easy. I grew up with five brothers and I have more male friends than female friends. And my peers my drug using peers are all my cousin brothers. We are all we are 12 of us who use we are only four of us alive now. So because I am a women I'm a girl those days when it was time for me to go for treatment. I mean when I was caught by my parents they said if you were a boy we would have sent you for treatment. So I never got treatment. So that is the scenario. My cousins were sent for treatment not me because I am a girl. And it's not acceptable. It's not acceptable that your daughter your sister is doing drugs. Sorry. It's not. So coming out as a drug user as I said it was very easy for me to compare to coming out as a drug user. But it was very easy for me to come out as a woman as a woman living with HIV. It was very easy. Now it is because of stigma. Again another thing is it's also because of the motivation the peer support that we get in the PL HIV field HIV field. We get lots of counseling. We give we get lots of motivation. I mean we are we are motivated. We are mentored. We are provided counseling. I mean we are sent we are being sent for exposures. I mean we have been invested in the HIV sector not the harm reduction sector. I'm not talking about harm reduction sector but I am today because who I am I'm able to I'm here today speaking because of the investment made by my by my friends. I mean those in HIV field. So if if the same level of commitment the same level of investment the same level of support. Beyond the women who use drugs it stigma can be you know it can be overcome. It's just about positive positive thing. I mean it's just about positive way of life. It has to but then this has to be shared which is not done. It's just about OK we need we have to draw your blood. It's it's Sentinel surveillance time this time. They are after us only when it's about it when it's time for testing for HIV mostly. So I I seriously believe that if if women who use drugs are being kind of supported or mentored or invested as people living with HIV women living I believe that a lot of women will come out a lot. Thank you. There's one question here. Right there. Thank you. I'm Asian woman. I'm from Nepal. I'm working as an advocate. So I really like your presentation not only related to drug even in the court room even in the court if there are women even if they are arrested for a simple theft like there will be the crowd in the courtroom. And if we talk about murder there will be like hundreds of people and normally like I look even the cases of the drug users and all. So if any girl or woman is arrested they all the time cover their face with this all and the first request would be please don't call any of my relative of my friends. So that's true. So I know these these all are the problems in most of our Asian countries. So what you suggest how to work how to deal with them how to deal with these issues how to deal with their parents how to convince them how to convince court how to convince police how to convince prison officials how to convince themselves how to make people understand. So what like what can we do together because it's the common problem of all I think almost all the Asian countries. What can we do together. We have to start I think we have to start from the basic from the scratch to address the issues of women who use drugs. I can't say this but then we have to start from the beginning that is start by counseling peer counseling so that the women drug users are motivated. They become they become more empowered. Yeah. Yes I think I think that is the I mean that is the starting starting point that we cannot just go and do advocacy for for issues of women who use drugs just like that. We have to develop we have to build the capacity of the women who use drugs for them to come out and present their issues. So and in order to do that like I said their capacities have to be built and build their capacities. We need support. And I believe that we will get support and that is the best. I mean that is the basis. We have to start from the scratch. Thank you. That's that's what I was going to say and that was part of the reason why we would have these sessions in in in secret. Because the whole motivation behind that was to empower the women develop their self confidence and their self efficacy so that as a group they would then feel empowered to take ownership and to actually speak out. And that's where you have to begin with the women but you can only do that by giving them the skills in the first place. And we could only give them the skills by putting on these open days or these sexual health days or whatever you wanted to call them so that the men in the community would quite happily allow their wives to attend these sessions because they didn't realize that really behind closed doors we were addressing other things which were related to drug use. OK. Thank you so much out of respect for time for the other speakers. We're going to move on.