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In this issue:
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Welcome to the last newsletter for Harm Reduction 2011: IHRA’s 22nd International
Conference, which opens in under 3 weeks time. Between now and Sunday 3rd April the
conference website will be regularly updated with the latest news and information and the online
registration system is open 24 hours a day. There is still time to register for the conference and
reserve your accomodation online, so please visit .
As the conference is approaching, we would like to share with you another update on the situation
in Lebanon. Please read the message from Rick Lines, the Executive Director of IHRA and Paddy
Costall, Managing Director of the Conference Consortium recent developments.
For further updates, please visit the '' section of the conference website.
In this issue, we would also like to encourage those who have not finalised their conference
registration yet, to do so as soon as possible. Delegates can still benefit from group discounts and
lower conference fees than those paid on arrival.
Delegates are also reminded to sign up to workshops running parallel to the main conference
programme.
We are pleased to inform that as part of the MTV International Drugs and Harm Reduction Film
Festival 2011, there will be a free 6-hour public screening at the Metropolis Art Cinema in down-
town Beirut on Saturday 2nd April . Middle East TV star Georges Kordahi will open the screening.
We would like to invite all delegates who will be in Beirut on Saturday to attend this session.
Finally, tweeting delegates are encouraged to join the twitter group - to share and receive up-to- date information about conference programme, media, and work being coordinated by other
delegates.
Should you have any questions or need further information, please contact us or visit the
conference website (). We look forward to welcoming you to Beirut!
Best regards,
The Conference Team Back to menu
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Update on Lebanon
With the conference less than a month away, we thought we would offer an update on the event and the ongoing preparations.
It is significant that the 53rd meeting of Arab Health Ministers took place last week at the conference venue, the Habtoor Grand Hotel, on March 9th and 10th. The meeting was moved to Beirut from its previous venue precisely because the city was judged to be politically calm and therefore appropriate venue to meet.
The situation in Lebanon remains stable and interest in the conference continues to grow as the opening day approaches. We are delighted that conference registrations continue to rise, ensuring that Harm Reduction 2011 will again bring together hundreds of our friends and colleagues from around the world.
The conference programme is shaping up to be one of the strongest yet, and we are pleased to have recently confirmed that our closing keynote speaker will be Dr Donya Aziz. Dr Aziz is a Member of the National Assembly in Pakistan, where she has chaired the HIV/AIDS Parliamentary Committee, and has been active on issues including women’s rights, health and development.
Interest in holding in the margins of Harm Reduction 2011 is very high, as partner organisations and international agencies seek to use the event to bring together their members and promote their activities. As a result, demand for meeting space is at a premium, and we encourage anyone hoping to organise a side event to make arrangements as soon as possible, as space is increasingly in short supply. Information for arranging side events is available on the conference website under ‘’.
Our conference media coordinator recently returned from a week in Beirut where, working together with MENAHRA’s media advisor, a series of meetings was held with the main national, regional and international press outlets. Media partnerships with five leading Lebanese media organisations were reached, their interest in the conference is higher than ever before, and the event will provide an opportunity to promote the harm reduction message throughout MENA and around the world.
The annual is also going from strength to strength, and we are pleased to announce that MTV has agreed to be the sponsor for this year’s festival. Also, for the first time, the festival will include a free 6-hour public screening at the Metropolis Art Cinema in downtown Beirut. This will provide a chance to bring the films away from the conference venue, and make them accessible to the general public.
We are looking forward to welcoming you all to Harm Reduction 2011.
Rick Lines - Executive Director, IHRA
Paddy Costall – Managing Director, Conference Consortium
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Finalising conference registration
Finalise online registration
Delegates who have not yet done so are urged to finalise the registration process at .
You can still take advantage of significantly lower conference fees to those paid .
Groups can still benefit from , which have been extended until the end of March 2011.
Conference check-in at the venue
Upon arrival, please check-in at the Registration Desk located next to the main entrance to the Habtoor Grand Hotel in the Dome.
Event management staff and volunteers will serve delegates at this desk at the following times:
Sunday 3rd April 11:00-17:00
Monday 4th April 07:30 - 18:00
Tuesday 5th April 07:30 - 18:00
Wednesday 6th April 07:30 - 18:00
Thursday 7th April 07:30 - 16:00
Delegates are kindly asked to bring their unique 4-digit registration ID to the registration desk for a quick check-in.
Please note: there is no entry to the conference venue without a valid participant's badge.
Check entry requirements
Please check whether you require a visa to enter Lebanon and other entry requirements at .
Information for speakers
Confirmed speakers are kindly asked to send their power point presentations to Grzegorz Król at
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.
Poster presenters will be informed of the date of their presentation and their assigned poster board via email later this week. Poster presentations will be exhibited for one full day each.
Airport pick-ups, shuttle buses & day tours
Please note that airport pick-up will be provided as part of the accommodation package if the hotel reservation was booked through Supreme Travel (official accommodation agent).
Delegates who booked their accommodation through Supreme Travel can also use the shuttle bus service provided from hotels to the venue every day. Shuttle buses will depart from Hamra, Sin El Fil, Hazmieh, Sodeco and Ain El-Mreise in Beirut. The schedule for the departures of shuttle buses will be provided by Supreme Travel shortly.
Supreme Travel is also offering special tours before and after the conference. During the event, delegates can take advantage of half day tours and various theme nights. For details, please contact
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.
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Programme highlights for 2011
The is available to download on the conference website.
This is the best place to view the final programme to confirm timimg of presentations, and to view
any last minute changes that may have taken place. Once again, the programme is full of engaging
presentations, debates, workshops and trainings and covers our broadest ever range of topics at
an IHRA event. We hope that there is a lot in the programme for all of our delegates to enjoy.
We would like to remind delegates that the Opening Session (which starts at 4pm, Sunday 3rd
April) will include a keynote address from Joanne Csete, the associate professor of Clinical
Population and Family Health at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health in New
York who will present on 'Intersecting inequities: in search of drug policy justice', and also Hussein
Gezairy, Regional Director for the World Health Organisation, Eastern Mediterranean Regional
Office.
The opening session will be followed by the welcome reception. All delegates are invited to join
the conference organisers at this welcome event in the exhibition area from 18.00 until 20.00.
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Sign up to workshop sessions online
We would like to encourage all delagates to take advantage of this new addition to the conference
programme. There is a limited number of places available for each workshop session, so please
register for your preferred sessions at the earliest convenience. If you register for workshops
online, please also re-confirm your participation at the IHRA booth on arrival. Workshop spaces are
running out fast, so please ensure to book your place soon!
The list of available workshops can be viewed
In order to register for workshops, please .
After you log on, you will see a "click here to sign-up for workshops" link on the welcome page.
The engaging and informative workshop and training stream will run alongside the main
conference sessions on Monday 4th, Tuesday 5th and Wednesday 6th April 2011. In total there will
be twelve workshop sessions across the three days for delegates to attend and enjoy.
Each workshop will be one and half hours in length and the trainings will start at 11.30 each day
and end at 17.30. There will be no workshops or trainings on Sunday 3rd or Thursday 7th April.
Topics of the workshops vary from overdose prevention, peer work, youth friendly harm reduction,
introducing and scaling up OST services to hepatitis c treatment and care and harm reduction in
prisons.
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MTV International Drugs and Harm Reduction Film Festival - Public Screening
In addition to the films listed in the main programme of the MTV International Drugs and Harm
Reduction Film Festival 2011, there will also be public screenings of eight films between 12.00 and
18.00 on Saturday 2nd April at the , Empire Sofil - Achrafieh, in Beirut.
The Middle East's biggest TV personality, Georges Kordahi, will open the event which will also be
attended by local celebrities. The media coverage of the public screenings will also bring
discussion of the issues raised in the films to much wider audiences across the MENA region.
For further details, please click .
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Community Action on Harm Reduction to be launched
We are pleased to inform that the International HIV/AIDS Alliance will launch the Community
Action on Harm Reduction (CAHR) project at the conference.
CAHR is an ambitious €10M project, funded by the Dutch government, spanning five
countries that will expand harm reduction services to more than 230,000 injecting drug
users, their partners and children.
IHRA is a participating organisation in this important project.
We would like to invite everyone for a drinks reception on Monday 4th April, 18:30-
20:00 at Bray Hall, Metropolitan Palace Hotel, Beirut.
Please RSVP your attendance by email to
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Follow us on Twitter
Join us on Twitter at @IHRA2011Beirut and join the conversation using #ihra2011, the official
conference twitter profile.
Tweeting delegates are encouraged to join the to share and receive up-to-date
information about conference programme, media, and work being coordinated
by other delegates.
IHRA and the Conference Consortium also publish regular conference updates on Facebook.
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Wednesday, 16 March 2011 13:37 | 
Written by IHRA | 
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