Activist and community organizer Ann Livingston presents at annual Woodrow Lloyd Lecture on drug user rights

News Release Release Date: February 6, 2013 11:15 a.m.

Activist and community organizer Ann Livingston will deliver the 2013 Woodrow Lloyd Lecture on Wednesday, February 6, 2013, at 7:30 p.m. in the Classroom Building (CL 112) at the University of Regina.

In her lecture entitled “Can Civil Disobedience Ensure Health Care Access for Drug Users? Why Engage in Civil Disobedience? Who Can and Can't?”, Livingston will discuss how the grassroots drug user group Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU) pushes for legal and policy changes that ensure an evidence-based public health approach to the use of legal and illegal drugs, using methods such as civil disobedience, research, documentation, networking and advocacy.

Livingston has made significant contributions toward improving access to health care for people who use illegal drugs. As co-founder and former executive director of the VANDU and in her current position as volunteer with the BC/Yukon Association of Drug War Survivors, she has inspired policy makers and health professionals to view illegal drugs users as citizens deserving of compassion, care and human rights. Through her leadership and activism, Livingston has aimed to ensure that drug users are organized and personally and politically empowered to work toward ending senseless deaths from preventable infectious diseases and drug overdose.

The Woodrow Lloyd lecture is presented annually by the Faculty of Arts, to recognize the outstanding contributions of former Saskatchewan Premier Woodrow Lloyd to the fields of education and social welfare.