He Kura Te Tangata

Published
September 2024

Lead Author
Dr Georgia McCarty¹

Co-authors
Dr Felicity Ware¹, Lindsay Poutama¹, Professor Antonia Lyons², Associate Professor David Newcome², Sophia de Fossard³

¹ Hāpai te Hauora
² The Centre for Addiction Research (CFAR), University of Auckland
³ National Institute for Health Innovation (NIHI), University of Auckland

Harm from drug addiction is a pervasive issue that adversely affects communities worldwide, and disproportionately burdens Māori communities in Aotearoa, New Zealand. Methamphetamine is a highly addictive stimulant that rapidly leads to dependence, with significant physical, psychiatric, social, and economic impacts particularly in communities with high deprivation. Methamphetamine use is rarely the only health, welfare, education or justice issue that whānau and communities are dealing with. Therefore, treatment needs to be able to address these complex and overlapping needs.

Hawke’s Bay, the central eastern coast region of the North Island has the highest rate of methamphetamine dependency across Aotearoa New Zealand. In Hawke’s Bay five initiatives were funded by MBIE and/or the ROCC, to provide methamphetamine harm reduction services in the region. This report presents the evaluation findings the eight recommendations identified based on the evaluation.

This evaluation is crucial because it highlights the important impact of community-led initiatives in addressing methamphetamine harm in communities. The purpose of the evaluation was to: (1) To describe and outline the initiatives developed by the organisation, (2) Demonstrate the value these initiatives add to their communities, and (3) Develop long term plans and strategies based on the evaluation findings.

This evaluation provides key insights into the importance of harm reduction models, community-centred approaches, the organisational vision of intergeneration well-being of communities, and the major challenges that community-based organisations currently face in aligning with funding and institutional policies.