A study done last year found that seven out of 10 pills sold on the street contain potentially lethal doses of synthetic drugs. Over 150 people nationwide die every day from these substances, like fentanyl or xylazine. A new harm reduction initiative in the Albuquerque music scene aims to help educate and protect people from these fates.
The Albuquerque Punk Safety Initiative was founded by two students from the University of New Mexico’s School of Medicine who also share a love for music.
Max Randall, 24, is in a punk-metal band called Nympf. He and Corrina Klein co-founded Abq PSI after witnessing far too many drug overdoses and incidents at shows in their community.
“Harm reduction is the idea of empowering people to be able to make their own decisions about what they do, and we're just here to provide them with safe resources. Which before harm reduction, the only thing that was really available was stigma and harm. So we just try to provide resources to keep people safe,” said Randall.
Abq PSI operates as a team of 10 directors who fill different roles. Randall is director of community outreach, while Klein is director of administration. They also have directors for education, social media, and much more to keep the initiative moving.
They became a non-profit organization last winter. This status gives them the opportunity to work with the New Mexico Department of Health and apply for grants to buy the supplies and resources they provide to the community.
Those include Narcan, drug testing strips, safe-use kits, and sexual contraceptives. They have recently been able to provide “Julie,” an emergency contraceptive similar to Plan B.
Albuquerque Punk Safety Initiative offers these resources and more at local music events. Randall says people often have preconceptions about what drug use looks like.
“And a lot of the time that's not the case. So I think a lot of the stigma surrounding drug-use, it's just shame,” said Randall.
Drug use and addiction take many forms, Randall says. It can be sugar or even doom scrolling on social media.
“Substances are neutral, so it's really just about making sure people are safe and mitigating harm to them. It’s just something that people need help with,” he said.
Albuquerque Punk Safety Initiative is open to volunteers. They are on Instagram at @abqpsi and are working on their website, which should be up soon and contain more resources on harm reduction.
