Dear friend,

I want to acknowledge the season we’re in. We know many folks will be stepping away from their desks later this month, preparing for New Year’s Eve plans and taking a breath after what has been a long and exhausting year for so many. Because of this, I’m sharing our first end-of-year giving request early.

As 2025 comes to a close, we’re looking at a landscape that represents both progress and heartbreak. Last year, the U.S. saw the largest decline in overdose deaths ever recorded, a promising 27% drop nationally. That happened because harm reduction works. Investing in harm reduction means more naloxone in people’s hands, more overdose response trainings, more linkages to treatment by harm reduction program staff, and more people showing up for one another when it matters most. These are the very strategies NHRC has championed for 30 years. 

While we celebrate the progress that led to more lives saved, the decline in overdose deaths was mostly among white cisgender people while Black, Latine/x, Native/Indigenous, LGBTQIA+ communities and individuals experiencing homelessness saw overdose rates climb. This underscores how structural inequity continues to shape this overdose epidemic.

That’s why this moment matters so much. NHRC is standing up for the communities that continue to be left behind by systemic neglect. Our team, which includes many folks with lived and living experience, spends every day training frontline workers, equipping harm reduction programs with the supplies, guidance, and technical support they need to keep people alive, and supporting peer leaders. 

We ask you to give as generously as you can to put naloxone in someone’s hand, pay a peer worker for their expertise, help a rural program get the support it needs, and ensure communities aren’t left behind. Your gift fuels the work that needs to happen now. Please give today. This movement has always been powered by the community, and we move forward because people like you choose to show up.


With gratitude and in solidarity,

Laura Guzman
Executive Director
National Harm Reduction Coalition



Link: bit.ly/NHRCEOYGiving




National Harm Reduction Coalition
243 Fifth Avenue
Box 529
New York, NY 10016
United States



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