Helen Redmond

The Mystery Lung Disease Caused by “Vaping” Was a Textbook Drug Panic

The opportunity that tobacco harm reduction haters have been waiting for finally arrived. On September 4, Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D)…

September 10, 2019

Watch: “Not One More!” Harlem Residents on Overdose Deaths

To mark International Overdose Awareness Day, I went out on the streets of Harlem and asked people for their thoughts…

August 31, 2019

Man Who Died of OD Was Allegedly “Kicked Out of Treatment for Smoking”

I can’t lose everything,” Paul Reithlinghshoefer told his mother when he relapsed back to using heroin in early 2017. Feeling…

August 19, 2019

El Chapo’s Trial Was a Drug-War Propaganda Circus

Extraditing drug dealers from around the world to stand trial in the States is a cynical attempt to demonstrate that…

August 2, 2019

Nicotine Testing for High Schoolers Is a Drug War-Style Disaster

As the so-called epidemic of teen vaping continues to garner sensational headlines—“Why vaping is so dangerous for teens”; “The scary…

July 25, 2019

Why the Smoking Ban in Public Housing Makes Residents’ Lives Worse

The first thing that greets you when you walk in is the stench of Pampers and rotten food, rodents and…

June 13, 2019

Filter Video: Inside Portugal’s First Mobile Safe Consumption Site

In April of this year, Portugal, a country well known for having decriminalized all drugs in 2001, got its first…

June 10, 2019

US Arrival of Heat-Not-Burn Is Another Option for Smokers to Switch

Last week the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved IQOS, a device that delivers nicotine by heating, not burning, tobacco…

May 7, 2019

Cops Morphing Into Social Workers Is Not a Solution

All across the US, law enforcement asserts its power through its sheer visibility in a vast array of public spaces.…

April 23, 2019

Rite Aid Is Wrong to Stop Selling Vapes (They’ll Still Sell Cigarettes)

In a huge blow to smokers who are trying to switch to safer nicotine products, Rite Aid, one of the…

April 18, 2019