Help SOL Collective COVID harm reduction outreach
Donation protected
Every week, SOL Collective volunteers hit the streets to support people who use drugs and our unhoused neighbors in Philadelphia. We distribute safer injection supplies, safer drug use supplies, Narcan, wound care kits, PPE, food, water, provide overdose reversal training, collect used syringes, hang out with folks, and link people to resources. We have been so incredibly lucky to have some items donated , but we really struggle to consistently maintain the supplies we need for this work. We are now facing an unanticipated supply shortage from one of our community supplier partners. This adds an additional crisis to the existing overdose, COVID-19, and housing crises crushing our communities.
Everything that we distribute and make available to our community is based on explicitly stated needs and not on our assumptions.
In the time of COVID-19, we have reconfigured our approach to outreach to meet the increased urgent community needs while also increasing our outreach supply quantities and range of resources.
We are now doing outreach from members’ cars and additionally distributing snacks, water, and masks when available. We have also started distributing kits for safer snorting and smoking -- forms of use that carry increased transmission risk during COVID if folks don’t have access to new or clean supplies. .
During the pandemic, we have received numerous requests from community members, particularly sex workers and/or women, for self-defense tools such as pepper spray, as desperation due to lack of resoures and a diminished drug supply drives up intimate partner violence and creates a riskier work environment.
Drug use not only comes with overdose risks, but other risks which are exacerbated by criminalization, poverty, racism, isolation, homelessness, and stigma. By providing safe injection and safe use supplies, we are able to mitigate some of the risks. New needles prevent HIV and Hepatitis C, sterile water and alcohol wipes prevent infection, wound care supplies allow folks to maintain the care given by our incredible medical team.
With winter coming, we know that life will get even harder for our friends living on the streets. Cold, damp weather means frostbite, pneumonia, and sadly, sometimes death. We need your help to continue and expand our efforts.
Raising $10,000 would give us enough money to self-fund our COVID-responsive essential outreach efforts for THREE MONTHS..
100% of the money we receive from this fundraiser goes directly to outreach supplies:
- $7 provides a safer injection kit and a wound care kit
- $12 provides 100 units of sterile water, giving people the option of using sterile water to inject, over puddle water or shared water
-$30 provides enough for bottled water for a week
-$50 provides enough disposable masks for one week
-$50 provides safer snorting kits for one week
-$60 provides enough for snacks for one week
-$75 provides safer smoking kits for one week
- $100 provides warm socks for one week
- $60 provides 12 pepper spray keychains to women and folks who are at additional risk of assault, r*pe, and unsafe relationships
- $100 provides 100 hand warmers to prevent frostbite
- $300 provides 4,000 clean needles, preventing the spread of HIV and Hep C.
By helping provide supplies to people on the ground, you're also helping our larger mission: supporting people who use drugs find stability so they can organize for the rights they deserve. You're helping a small but determined grassroots group make radical change, create a better world for people who use drugs, and strive for some semblance of safety in the city of brotherly love.
Thank you <3
Everything that we distribute and make available to our community is based on explicitly stated needs and not on our assumptions.
In the time of COVID-19, we have reconfigured our approach to outreach to meet the increased urgent community needs while also increasing our outreach supply quantities and range of resources.
We are now doing outreach from members’ cars and additionally distributing snacks, water, and masks when available. We have also started distributing kits for safer snorting and smoking -- forms of use that carry increased transmission risk during COVID if folks don’t have access to new or clean supplies. .
During the pandemic, we have received numerous requests from community members, particularly sex workers and/or women, for self-defense tools such as pepper spray, as desperation due to lack of resoures and a diminished drug supply drives up intimate partner violence and creates a riskier work environment.
Drug use not only comes with overdose risks, but other risks which are exacerbated by criminalization, poverty, racism, isolation, homelessness, and stigma. By providing safe injection and safe use supplies, we are able to mitigate some of the risks. New needles prevent HIV and Hepatitis C, sterile water and alcohol wipes prevent infection, wound care supplies allow folks to maintain the care given by our incredible medical team.
With winter coming, we know that life will get even harder for our friends living on the streets. Cold, damp weather means frostbite, pneumonia, and sadly, sometimes death. We need your help to continue and expand our efforts.
Raising $10,000 would give us enough money to self-fund our COVID-responsive essential outreach efforts for THREE MONTHS..
100% of the money we receive from this fundraiser goes directly to outreach supplies:
- $7 provides a safer injection kit and a wound care kit
- $12 provides 100 units of sterile water, giving people the option of using sterile water to inject, over puddle water or shared water
-$30 provides enough for bottled water for a week
-$50 provides enough disposable masks for one week
-$50 provides safer snorting kits for one week
-$60 provides enough for snacks for one week
-$75 provides safer smoking kits for one week
- $100 provides warm socks for one week
- $60 provides 12 pepper spray keychains to women and folks who are at additional risk of assault, r*pe, and unsafe relationships
- $100 provides 100 hand warmers to prevent frostbite
- $300 provides 4,000 clean needles, preventing the spread of HIV and Hep C.
By helping provide supplies to people on the ground, you're also helping our larger mission: supporting people who use drugs find stability so they can organize for the rights they deserve. You're helping a small but determined grassroots group make radical change, create a better world for people who use drugs, and strive for some semblance of safety in the city of brotherly love.
Thank you <3
Organizer
Billy Ray Boyer
Organizer
Philadelphia, PA
