[Memory of policies and practices in harm reduction: an interview with Fatima Machado].

This interview addresses the trajectory of harm reduction policies and practices in Brazil, in the words of harm reducer Fatima Machado. Harm reduction emerged in the 1980s in Europe, it began in Brazil in 1989 as a strategy to prevent aids among injection drug users, and then diversified and expanded. This interview focuses on the early years of developing these innovative practices and questions their current developments.

[Crack usage circuits in the downtown area of the city of São Paulo (SP, Brazil)].

Although drug usage has been prevalent since the dawn of humankind, drug abuse has currently escalated alarmingly and can be characterized as a public health problem. The spread of "crack," a drug derived from cocaine paste, is worsening the situation by aggravating the social damages and harming the health of users. An ethnographic study was conducted in downtown São Paulo, SP (Brazil) in locations where crack is sold and used in order to establish the impact of the spread of this drug in the daily life of users.