ANYONE ' S CHILD MEMORIAL
WE DID IT TOGETHER !
Grateful thanks to our brilliant speakers , our sponsors – Camurus , Ethypharm and Gilead – and all our exhibitors . Special thanks to our volunteers – Nicky , Jay , Nicola and Stacey from Solihull Recovery Community ; Andy , Sam , Alex , Katie , Lee , Danny , Allan and Jackie from the Hep C Trust ; Karen and Bev ; to Paolo for filming , and to everyone who sent photos . Thanks to each one of you who contributed ideas and worked on the programme – and to all of you who came along , including Naloxone Man , to make it a success !
For more coverage , photos and videos of the DDN Conference use the QR code or visit www . drinkanddrugsnews . com
ANYONE ' S CHILD MEMORIAL
Anyone ’ s Child : Families for Safer Drug Control were delighted to be invited along to the DDN Conference , and marked the lives of those who have died from drug overdose , writes Jane Slater
We laid 4,335 handmade ‘ forgetme not ’ flowers to mark each life lost last year , and to call on the government to change our failing and outdated drug laws and control and regulate the drug market . Many of our flowers are made by the relatives of those they have lost and bore the names of loved ones . We were encouraging attendees at the conference to make their own flower and to add the name of a loved one to them .
It ’ s tragic to see how so many people at the conference had
lost someone to our failed drug laws – this suffering goes so deep and is so avoidable . I think lots of people looking were shocked at the sheer scale of just how many people are dying . One young man was sat on the ground next to our flowers . As he got up he said to me : ‘ That one was for my mother – she died last week .’ Anyone ’ s Child are campaigning for change to stop this suffering . We need a fundamental rethink of our drug policies to keep our loved ones safe and well .
Jane Slater is campaign manager for Anyone ’ s Child
SEPTEMBER 2024 • DRINK AND DRUGS NEWS • 23