IAS Distinguished Speaker Series – Alex Kral, PhD

Talk title: Overdose Prevention Sites: Global and Domestic Research, Policy and Implementation

Talk description: In the midst of an ongoing opioid overdose mortality crisis and a deepening housing crisis that are disproportionately impacting black, Indigenous, and other people of color, we need innovative policies and programs. While Overdose Prevention Sites (OPS) have existed for over three decades in Europe, Canada, and Australia, they have only recently been implemented in the United States, and even then, only under limited and precarious circumstances. Dr. Kral will contextualize OPS within US drug policy, briefly review the global evidence on OPS effectiveness, and provide a thorough summary of the extant domestic research on the implementation and effectiveness of OPS.

Bio: Alex H. Kral, a Distinguished Fellow at RTI International, is an infectious disease epidemiologist with expertise in policy-relevant, community-based research with urban poor populations. Dr. Kral is the principal investigator or co-investigator on several National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)–funded and Laura and John Arnold Foundation–funded studies of the relationship between infectious diseases, criminal legal system involvement, substance use, and poverty. He has authored or coauthored more than 200 articles in peer-reviewed journals and is frequently consulted by media.