Got our agenda pulled up, I don't know if we did this last time, but should we do it just a quick check in, how are we all doing? I can start. I am good.  Did a lot of cross country skiing, which was awesome, and a much needed change of scenery, so feeling pretty refreshed from that. Hey, Shayna, we're just starting with some check ins. Thank you. Sorry I'm late. I was running late, no real excuse. 5, 10, and 12. I'm just blown away with the ability of kids up here to do things like skiing and stuff. I'm blown away too, and they're my kids. My five-year-old, I've been downhill skiing with her this year too, and she's just amazing, bombing down the mountain without a fear in the world, so yeah, it's great to watch. Wild. Shayna, it's Michael Sherman. He's on the call. We're starting. Oh, okay, sorry. All right, I had to block my screen. All right, bye. I'm glad that was caught on recording. That's awesome. I'm really sorry. I've already said congratulations to Lauren as well, is that? I'm excited. All right, let's keep checking in. Who's going to go next? I can go. My kids, 14 and 12, were at home. They had a winter break for 12 days, and they just start the school today, and I think my holiday will start today. Plus working, right? Other than that, there was nothing new in my life, so everything is smooth and we are still healthy and waiting for the vaccination. I have asthma, but I checked the high risk group. Apparently I'm not in it. So just waiting to hear. So I can go and get my vaccination and be ready for the rest of the year. That's all. Do professors count as educators or is that all like K through 12? Cool. My, my kids. Don't, aren't you, don't you teach at Norwich? Would you count under that? Yeah. Yeah, I teach online. So I'm at home. Yeah, but Matthew will get into that one. Yeah, I heard that teachers are having their vaccinations soon. Yeah. Which is a good news. I have lots of friends who are teachers and they were really anxious and, you know, they didn't know what to do because most of them are like doing face to face teaching. So I'm relieved for them. Now I'm waiting for my turn. I can check in quickly. Yeah. Very excited and grateful to be back for another term. And I've been working very hard with some amazing volunteers for a little, a little city council race, which has been fun. And now I feel like I need a break to get up and some sleep. But, but it's been, it's been great. And just so excited to get to continue this work and some other great projects in this role. So thanks to everyone who, who helped in many ways. I had nothing special to report except I got my second COVID shot. And did not have the, the reaction that I guess 60% of the people do, but anyway, it was easy. And now I'm just waiting out my last two weeks before I'm super immune. Yeah. Flonting it around town, surely. I just got a date for what, I mean, not a date for what I'm getting it, but I'm type one diabetics. So I'm now on the list for March 15th. And I'm like, I had a little party and yeah, very, very excited because I've been very obnoxiously careful. And I probably, I was also, I was like, I'm not sure how much of that is going to change once I get the vaccine. Like my parents aren't vaccinated yet and other things, but I'm feeling really, really hopeful. Yeah. Cameron, have you been Can't complain. Same as always. You know, yesterday was town meeting day. We had a really great turnout and overwhelming margins for the budget. So that is a big source of work that's behind us since now we can move forward with that budget. So I'm really excited. I have nothing personal to share because I have done nothing. And so Work's all I got. We're doing good. Good. Should I kick us off here? What's that? Do you want me to keep us going or you want to take the reins? Feel free to keep us going. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah, great. Thank you, Jeremy. I can do that. So next up is just to review and approve the February minutes. That Michael sent a few days ago. Has everyone had a chance to just quickly review those and anyone have any suggestions or edits? Okay. I move we adapt the minute. I can second. I got, I missed it. Who, who, who made the motion? It was me. Oh, okay. All those in favor of adopting the minutes. Say hi. Hi. Hi. Opposed. Minutes passed. Right. Moving along. Anyone have anything to share of interest to the group and our work? Any learning, reading, et cetera. Actually do. I've been going, there's a. A couple of different LGBTQIA groups. That came together and held a bunch of forums for. That group. And I belonged to that. So I went to those. And there was a couple, there was like one on aging and housing and racial justice. And they've led to some really interesting conversations.  That was sort of like the culmination of the series that had a couple of our. State legislature on the call. And we sort of talked about. If we had. You know, funding and like funding was not an option or not. What am I thinking of? What are the words? Anyway, if funding was not an issue. What would we be focused on? And. I. There was a lot of insights there. And that report I think is. They're sort of compiling all of that. We'll have a report that I would love to share with y'all. When it comes to fruition, but. I think it was a, you know, I'm not sure why. Yeah. But there's a number of ways we're. Asking the legislature that was there to really support the position that they created in the state. They, I can't remember what her title is necessarily, but I know she's like the equity. Person for the state. Funding that in a way where it can be useful instead of. Just sort of a check the box position. Wifi infrastructure and other like, you know, ways to connect our rural communities and then talked about aging in place, which is a big concern, you know, and how that sort of ties into everything. And there was a couple of folks that I talked to who are really interested in like bringing the city, proposals for like congregate living spaces, intergenerational spaces, which I thought was really interesting. So as soon as I have like something tangible that I can like give you out of that, I will definitely share that information. But they were really cool and I'm glad that they happened to me a lot of really neat people. Thanks for sharing that. I can share. I did this Jewish Organizing Fellowship in Boston called Join for Justice, Jewish Organizing and Student Network. After college and I just got, they're doing like an online organizer training program with different like cohorts for like clergy and for like Pittsburgh area Jews. And then there's also like a cohort for Jews with disabilities that I got asked to be a trainer in so it's like a seven week long series and they're providing like the content but then like to like hold the hold the groups and stuff. And there's just like a lot of really incredible readings as part of it both with around like disability justice like that everyone's doing. And then also just around like the state of the world that we're in and so I'm like trying to find like not feel like here's the full curriculum because it's a lot of reading but I'll see if I can find one and I'll maybe share it in the chat later on but it's just a lot of, you know, during during COVID right now like how are, you know, in indigenous folks getting to the polls and responding to, like, you know, there's like articles just about like kind of all all sorts of different stuff is kind of part of like the opening. And then we'll be getting more into like the training parts but I just hadn't read some of these articles and I thought they were really powerful. So I will, I will find one in the chat. Cool. Thank you. Anyone else have anything to share. Okay. Let's keep going then. So let's hear some updates from the various city committees that members are involved with. So I know we've got the police review committee. That are only one or maybe the community, the community fund committee to Michael and anything from the city but when we start with the police, police review. Lauren you want to talk for the police review committee. So I can give an update and Michael flush it out. So one of the big efforts we're doing right now is outreach so there's both partnership with the creative discourse crew for some of the outreach and then doing some other outreach for some groups that aren't part of the creative discourse like victims of violence or survivors of violence and some other groups and so we're kind of in the process of figuring out how to, how to do that outreach to connect with people and do it in a way that doesn't create harm. So that's kind of an ongoing process of figuring out but that will be a big priority of that group where, you know, which kind of intersects with this effort of course.  And as that gets, I think a little bit more kind of laid out, then it might be worth sharing some of that with you all just to get input. If you know for whoever's interested. I don't think the group needs to do to do it formally but just knowing that you all might be interested in looking at that, you know as that starts to shake take shape for like report and recommendations and like the kind of vision for community I would be, I think it would be great to share with you all for for whatever input you would want to provide. And I think April 5 is going to be a general public meeting so once we get the details on that we can share it. Those are the highlights and Michael or Cameron what else. That's good. Is the committee planning to make some kind of present initial presentation at that public forum for folks to respond to or is it more just seeking perspectives from community folks. We're still in the discovery stage so I think we have no, we've been meeting with various folks. We had Rory, Tivo, the state's attorney for Washington County met with us, and then Ari, what was his last name from the public defenders group met with us last time. And we're doing, we've blocked each of us has an assignment of one or two topics to collect information and send, send questions along to chief Pete. And we're trying to just continue getting information before we start making any public comments so that that April 5 meeting will also be information gathering. Great. There's nothing much to report from the community fund with the passing of the budget all of our recommendations were then approved were therefore approved so you know, we're done until next November. So that's really, that's the cadence you'll kind of lay low until now. Well, yeah, I mean we meet once or twice in the middle in the interim to review our application to make sure that you know to see what what turned up in the years in the previous cycles, previous cycle that might warrant some further changes to the guidelines. And then we meet shortly we meet again in the late summer to set deadlines and to have a plan for outreach to, you know, get the applications out. And then they go out and then we don't do we then it's usually the deadline is usually the Monday after Thanksgiving. And then right shortly after that, within a couple of weeks early in December we meet to review the applications and make make our recommendations. So, it's very intense for a couple of months and then like duty for the rest of the year. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah, Laura. So noting, which we could think about or people could think about before our next meeting so for city council. Usually like March into April is when we do strategic planning for the year so identify our key initiatives. You know, obviously, keeping, I will keep like the project that we have ongoing but if there's, there's anything else that really does shape like where we, you know, put time on the city council agendas and where you know it's both to keep, I think, focused and so staff note can anticipate like what's coming up for the year. So, you know, obviously other things come up but it's, it's really helpful if there's anything we think we might be wanting to work on to get it in that, you know, as part of that process so that it's like on the radar of both the council and staff. Great. I wonder. I'll put this to you Shayna, maybe we could reserve some time at our next meeting to have a focus discussion about what we might kind of pass to the council. I feel like it's the timing is a little bit goofy because we're going to probably be getting the presentation from creative discourses about what their recommendations for the strategic plan should be like, right as you're in the midst of it, you know, so I'm, I'm just feeling like like want it. Yes, I feel like we should probably talk about it and that we're going to come out with these recommendations probably like right after the city council does the time. And a lot of it is like issues that people want to like do work on it. They're not like fleshed out. So I, you know, it could be as simple as making sure that, you know, that space for moving forward with the recommendations of the creative discourse, you know, our C. Jack process are part of our strategic priorities for the year and then like without, and then the details can come later. So I think, but so I think that could, I was assumed would be one of them that like I would be bringing forward so like the way the process works is like different counselors are putting ideas on the table and then we kind of all discuss them together and come up with a set of priorities and you know whether or not that becomes a priority of the council writ large like a lot of it gets captured as just things that are on the minds of various counselors so I'm also realizing I think I think that most that we could. Yeah, and most of the focus groups are going to be completed by over the next two weeks and so before we meet again so even if we don't have the report maybe we should just invite Keisha and and Sue and maybe Tabitha to like just do like an oral report back of like okay here like the top three things that are going to be in our report and so we could just kind of get that on the table and see it. I think that would be that would be great. I'll put that on my agenda talk to them about. Yeah, that would be super helpful. Cameron any other city news to update on other than the election. No. I don't think so. I did. I will share it. I'll email it to y'all. Creative discourse asked the city for a sort of definitive statement that we will do X with the recommendations that come out of this and, you know, that seemed. Not wrong by any means but just we couldn't say with definitive like we can't I don't know what they're going to recommend right. I don't know if all of it could be possible or feasible.  But I did write so so I wrote something that I think answered a lot of their questions is how we will be held accountable for this work and how accountability is built into the city systems and what that looks like so I wrote that document and sort of asked them to check the language and they were good with it so I will that with y'all that was done today so I'll copy y'all on that email but it's just a statement that says we're going I mean we are taking this seriously this is important to us this is an ongoing process. We're going to act like accountability for doing these things this is not work that's going into a void which I think was the issue that they had was that all of these folks are going to come and put a lot of emotional energy and work into this for us. What are they going to do with it right. Are they going to speak it into the void, or is it going to actually accomplish something so really wanted to as much certainty as I can give that this sort of work will be ongoing. You know the only thing I couldn't promise was the immediacy of everything right. So, I will share that with y'all, but that's I think the only update I have. Okay, so it's over to you Shayna for whatever updates you have to start us off on the creative discourse work. Yeah, so first of all, we're having the meetings. It's happening. It's been so long and then I feel like all of a sudden they're all happening within like two weeks and I was a little bit of. So, thank you for Cameron for mostly for creative discourses for dealing with that. But yeah I just wanted to just kind of do a check in about the scheduling that's happening and then the group, the like the groupings of these groups that has been shifting around. So, and then wanting to talk a little bit about outreach particularly for the March night focus group. And so, excuse me. So, for the affinity groups as you guys have probably seen what was initially going to be 10 meetings is now three is now seven, not three. So, pushing together kind of the folks with precarious housing or financial stress, people with disabilities and young people into having one meeting. And so I can pull up. Sorry to do this beforehand. Just a little bit more of their rationale for that. Actually, I think I emailed over that ration their rationale for for why to do that. And their plans are to have like breakout groups within that, within that meeting. So, how many people come. So just kind of overall like we have all these meetings schedules we have like a good number of people RSVP for each of them creative discourses is now sending out the confirmations to the folks who had signed up and you know making sure that everyone knows what to do with the project and things like that which is great. And the only one where we are where there's like not really enough people signed up to have it be what was envisioned was this was this third, this meeting where there's the three groups coming kind of coming together. There's not a lot of RSVPs and just like not a lot of breath within those RSVPs. So, for the, like young people cohort, I think they said they've been doing a lot of outreach but that they are feeling like a lot young folks are just really tapped out and really, really zoomed out I suppose and so, but they want to you know, checking in on if we should do more concerted outreach there. And then I've gotten so on all like the emails and stuff that's been going on from porch form and things I've been putting like my phone number on the bottom are going to be like, or it's on the, I think it's on the, on the form. So, I think a lot of calls from folks were saying, why are you doing outreach for people with financial stress and housing and security if you need to have a computer to be able to participate in the call and like to be able to sign up for the call. And it's like, yeah, you're like, yep, that's, that's real. And so talking with creative discourse on Monday. Another suggestion was to have flyers to post around town. And so just, you know, recognizing this meeting is just next week. And so I drafted the flyer that I touched the email, but that sues here. All of these things are like, 54 different emails so I'm sorry. Can't remember all of this. The response was like, um, you know, like having the directness of inviting people to join without having to RSVP, but like putting the zoom link the phone number out there in such a public way would open us up for like zoom bombers or for people to participate in the RFI is being part of those groups like we would just have no control over what that could be which could be really awful and really disruptive and and so the, you know, suggestion that Sue had was like, have people call a phone number or email someone to ask for the information to join the session. I, so I was going to do this yesterday but I just was feeling really stuck with how to do it and I wanted to crowdsource from you guys about how to do this. So that was two things so one for changing around the groupings and the timing of these meetings does all of that make sense is anyone have any questions with any of that. Just tell me again the housing housing disabilities young people and people in financial stress all four of those. There were three groups so it was people financial stress and housing insecurity. It's still its own was what no that was like going to be one. And so it was those three people experiencing financial stress and housing insecurity young people and people with disabilities are now like all going to be in one group. Okay. Yeah I haven't had. I haven't had any response from the, the youth contacts that I reached out to. I will try again today. So I don't, I don't know if it's because I don't have relationships with folks and they don't trust when I'm ringing. So, yeah, I'll just try again but crickets. I talked with Matt McClain who is one of the three people who works with students doing stuff outside the school. And he he was right before school break and so he said well wait until the students are back in school. So you may get something this week or next week. He's on the agenda now and he'll talk with the two who do off school off campus internship for learning and then he has some other position within that group but anyway he said it was a good idea and he'd he'd work on it. Maybe something will happen. And he'll get, he'll get back to me but I could call him and let him talk to you directly if you'd prefer Jeremy. Yeah, I mean, you know what I mean is if he needs to talk to somebody that's fine but really, we just need him to promote it with the young people he knows and get them to sign up through that form. So we don't, we don't need to have a lot of like steps in the process if he can just, if he's clear on things and can communicate it to whatever students he's working with and get them to sign up and I think that's what we need. Okay, well, maybe I'll be a little proactive and send him the form and say he can distribute. On it, you know we're having people RSVP ahead of time, but we're just for this one I think we're just going to have people signing up until the very last moment. Yeah. And Shayna if you want to put my work phone number on the flyer. If you don't want to hand out your for anybody's personal numbers please do that. My number is a public number anyone can call me anytime. And then you, I mean, this is like all the logistic and then would you like write down people's numbers or emails or just give them the zoom or the phone call information like right then. Yeah, I could just, yeah, I could do that. I don't have that zoom information so if you said, oh yeah. And, but yeah, I can just give it to them right then. So that would be amazing so okay so put out put out can't like call this number for the information to join at this time. And I can just put that on the flyer and then. Thank you, that'd be amazing. And then for the flyer and I, and I was just going to, I was going to bring us back to like another way and to Bethany church, not a stack but like a few. Um, like was, yeah, is there anywhere else that would be particularly helpful I really want to do this today if possible because it is less than a week away at this point or a week away at this point. And so just, um, should I print off extra stacks to bring to you guys to distribute or any other place that would be particularly useful. I would recommend the senior center because there are some who who are in that situation. Um, you'll also get folks put up the flyers in the bus stops and like the parklets downtown. Awesome. My other excuse for not doing this yesterday was it was so cold that the time was it. But I think I can do it today. So, you can use yesterday for as an excuse for lots of things. Okay, so I'll try to, I'll try to do that and hopefully we'll have a plethora of responses and we'll, we'll have to be turning people away at the doors but not if we're not going to, that's not going to happen. So, this will be great help putting them on today I can help you I live in one pillar. You just need to give time frame to me then I can at least come and hold your. Hold it and take it. Yeah. It's up to you. Just let me know. Yeah, I was going to do it around like 430. If that works. Well, go print them at 430 and then. Yeah, so maybe like 445. Fine. Whenever you want to email me the place and the time I will be there. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And then I also, we were going to your daughter had some connections to some students that we're going to reach out to two and I think that was more for recruiting for participating in this but I didn't know if you'd also reach out to them about coming to this meeting because coming from the youth would also probably be really awesome. You For our focus groups or this meeting you mean for the for the youth focus group. Yeah. Oh, no, I didn't mention I can. Yeah, this to I was just thinking about one creative discourses was saying another place to go for youth is the basement. Oh, of course. Yeah. At City Hall. Yeah, they are actually we've been letting them come in work technically close but they do come in so Okay. Great. Thank you for your creative discourse updates, Janet. Cameron, you were also on that call on Monday. Was there anything else to share, or do you maybe you wanted to share about how the first focus groups went to The first focus group was with general staff that were not public safety oriented and I've talked to quite a few folks. And that is no one reads my emails so a lot of folks were missing the context I think of what they were being asked to do. I think a lot of folks thought it was a training so surprise surprise. Um, so I'll I've one of my learning steps from that was to I'm going to go to the police and fire guys verbally tell them what is happening and what is expected. To say that went really well. My staff is really excited about it. I feel a lot of them are very invigorated by the conversation. I also had some action items come out of my staff. One of them being. We have a translation line that's paid through the police department. So other folks and other departments don't necessarily have access to that translation line. And we're probably under serving communities that we don't even know we're under serving. Because why would you go into an office that you know isn't going to be able to talk to you. We're working I'm working right now on talking to the school to see who they use, and maybe either asking them to piggyback on that or expanding our contract with the language line that we use for police department. That's available to everyone. So I'm looking into that what that means and what that would look like for us, but as an immediate action that came out of that that we're just going to go ahead and do so. That was exciting for me. I think also, there was a lot of folks who've never thought about this before in the context of their work. And, you know, I have received no negatives. So that's really great and I'm really myself so. Yeah, looking forward to hearing what happens in the next one. That's a great outcome about expanding translation services. Yeah, we're excited. I shall move on then to a fundraising discussion. Lots of what our topic here is so Shayna do you want to. Yeah, the context here is that we, we needed more funds for doing the, the compensation for participation, and excuse me, and so I reached out to the grand tours to who are supporting this work and they were like, yeah, it's part of the project like that makes, of course. And so that's great. And then that means that we don't have funds right now to pay for the second round or like the next round of the contract with creative discourses. So knowing that you know the next fiscal year is coming up, you know, in July, but like that there were a couple of other steps that we were going to do between now and then. And at the last meeting, you know, Michael was saying like, I feel like we've really hit a wall with with grant fundraising, and like that there's not a lot more options we can probably go back to the same groups that we have applied here, and we're still waiting to hear back from some grants as well, but that Michael, I was kind of saying like, I think we're going to need to do more individual fundraising and like reaching out to folks in our communities. And so I just know we had done this, like, six months ago and it was wildly unsuccessful. And so just wanting to like have it like, like, how does this sound for folks like should we slow like, yeah, just having a conversation about it because like, do we need to slow down our timeline do we need to just to rely more on the city budget do we need to do more like direct one on one conversations rather than like holding fundraising events like, especially now that we're going to have like kind of as you talked about Jeremy we're not like more specific things to fundraise about. Should we just hold off and like not even fundraise until we like, have the response from creative discourses and slow down in that way but um, yeah, just, is there any other fundraising next step, but mostly we've we've we can use the funds for the stipends which is great. I wonder about how, like, if we could do a little test run with some individual outreach like it's a very tangible thing to be like, can you contribute so we can sponsor so we can be hearing from people like here's what, like it's a very real thing for people to help and to like help ensure that people can participate and that we're hearing from people and I don't know if people would be interested in something that like as individuals or not. I feel like the previous one was more like we have a process fun process. I just get excited about. So, it seems worth trying to maybe do a little bit if we all identified, you know, three people that we know that we think might be interested to see if we've got traction and if we're getting traction and it seems like more effort and if we're like it's falling flat we could like regroup the email or something and we just like. I don't know I would just be curious like I think it's a kind of easy pitch and whether or not exciting to people I don't know but um, for now and then but then I yeah I overall still think like we'll have better luck with bigger opportunities once we're a little bit farther along and have more specific things to be. I think it's exciting to people like even though like expanding translation services like that's like a very tangible thing that might cost money that could we support that kind of stuff that but I don't know one idea. I agree with that I think that the effort to try to get people to come to another zoom meeting. And there are just too many zoom meetings going on and I think the most effective way and everybody who raises funds says this is you go to individuals. Because they're using your relationship with them to, which is a trust relationship basically if they if they think that you're on the level with them, then you'll be able to get contributions. I would suggest what I think Shayna was getting at if everybody if each of us chose three people and send that list to Shayna so that we don't have duplication. And, and then, you know, make commitment to contact three people. And, you know, in the next, I don't know if we can do it in two weeks, but in, you know, within within a month anyway. We can see what comes of that. And if it works well then we just to, you know, continue on that three more people and stuff like that. Because we're not asking for tremendous amount of money for this. But if the idea is that we're using the money for this this the stipends to have people participate or if we're starting to use it to launch projects I think that that's a far more convincing line and we need to hire a consultant. Well, and so this is this is a, so we can use the grant funds that we got for the stipends. So we're, we're actually we are good on site I mean that's right. But I just think that pitch because I mean anything that we don't have to use the grant for we could use for creative discourse or the other work so to me like saying like you can sponsor one people or two people or three people with $150 like I feel like that picture be easier to make and so you know and it's just like, yeah, great. And then freeze up the money for other purposes from the grant. That makes sense to me, and then right and then we can circle back on this conversation after we have the proposals and see if there's additional funders or whatever to to ask to support that work. Okay. I can commit to doing that. I commit to doing that. Does somebody, maybe it's whoever, or if somebody thinks they would have time to like write up a few talking points or if there was like a little blurb follow up with the link to how people can contribute. That would be super helpful. But put in the. Yeah, I can, I can do that. But feel free to make it your own because also I'm not not a writer so. Shall we move on to recruitment updates any anyone have anything to share on that that front. I have tried to socialize this through contacts at the Unitarian Church, particularly in its racial justice group. I can keep kind of pushing on that I haven't heard from anyone saying yes, I'm yeah. So that's, that's all I have to report on that front. Does anyone have any other ideas about what other channels we might pursue to recruit folks. When I spoke when I spoke with Matt McClain I also mentioned that we need, you know, we were looking for young members for the committee and he said he'd keep that in mind too. I'm also just wondering if we can flag this for Keisha and Sue to be like, if there's anyone who is really awesome. Like if that's going to be a breach of confidentiality or if it's just like a. We think you should reach out to them like a person. Yeah, at the end you can always ask them to just be like hey, you know if this is work that you're interested in continuing with the city they're always, you know, you're welcome to put in an application. Pitch it at the end, could ask them to do that. Yeah, makes sense. We don't have to. Okay. My computer just lose screened of death. I don't know what's going on. Any other thoughts about recruitment for today. Well, send that email to one to Keisha and Sue. All right. So moving on to our kind of catch all other businesses anyone have anything else to raise for the group today. I did. I did note that the website has been updated. Thanks Cameron for making that happen. So we are current. Thanks. Thanks for running this efficient meeting. Awesome. The agenda was there. I just read it. I'll just say I just put in the chat what I've been putting at the bottom of the invitation, so I've been like blasting out to everyone. And I think that is helpful language for free to snag it. Thank you. Donate $15 today to stipend one participant or $700 to sponsor a whole focus group. And I'll say we have gotten to donations in our PayPal during this time. Oh, cool. Sorry, I should have said that during the fundraising update. Cool. Well, I think there's no other business that's that takes us out to the end. All right. Appreciate all y'all. So it's moving. Okay. Thanks all. See you soon.


How's it going everybody? Dato Doi here with a very exciting video and I thought they could pull the fast one over me by releasing this trailer at 4 a.m. but psych I'm staying up for Android 17. I've been so excited for this character here. So as usual we're going to take a look at this extremely short trailer here. Wow it doesn't even go. Oh my god we got 27 seconds. 27 seconds and then we're just going to go through it a bit slower the next time analyze it a little. Usually these videos are pretty fast because you know short trailers but that doesn't mean that I'm not looking forward to this dude. Let's get into it with the intro right away.  All right I like it dude. Recently the intros have been a little exaggerated so it's nice to see. Whoa palm strikes. Wow classic barrier that's not going to be too useful but of course you got to have it. Damn that that that keyblast move. Yo that was sick. Oh this dude looks like Bardock. This dude looks like Bardock. Uh oh that was his level three. All right that's that looked pretty cool. It looked a little better in the screenshots just because you know there is a screenshot doesn't have a lot of motion but whole. All right you're oh you already know we're going back to that um oh that is not the speed. You already know we're going back to the um let's see let's skip the intro. We're definitely going back to the oh god the sound. All right we're definitely going to look at some of this. Oh he has a cross up. Okay wait whom am I thinking of? Like Piccolo. Cross up like Piccolo. All right nice. So just like Piccolo's uh demon elbow he can go behind and like palm strike. Wait a minute. Oh Trunks. This is Trunks' auto combo. Jet well not the first jab but that knee and then that's classic Bardock. Hello? That's classic Bardock.  Oh wait a minute wait wait hold on did the barrier cancel into that? Uh maybe it's it might just be some editing trickery. Ooh all right referencing the tournament of power arc obviously we have some wall jumps that might be super useful actually. All right so you can jump to a wall maybe cross them up. Uh gimmicks and Dragon Ball fighters usually aren't the greatest part of a character. You know gimmicks are there uh but uh in this game the gimmicks really don't define the character too much uh so it it'll be it'll be interesting to see how this gets used uh but I wouldn't expect it too much. Tell me why Bandai is showing off that he can reflect moves. What a no not the most uh but oh not the best part of the trailer for sure and then we got the Key Blast that's uh nothing too special he could do that with 18 and okay vanish Key Blast vanish that's also good. All right now we're back into the more interesting stuff we have him throwing out these Key Blasts that seem to curve at an angle. Um the second one does go a bit higher not sure if you can control these fully or if it's just a you know you do it twice and you get this kind of deal kind of like uh let's say maybe Kid Boo. But yeah this could be interesting again it kind of depends on whether or not you can superdash through these and are they a command or are they just a Key Blast they they look like like a kamehamehanami uh so yeah if that's the case and you can't superdash through them then you know anything that can't be superdashed through is definitely welcome uh but you know they're not going to show that off in the trailer. Okay just what is this this is a normal combo I assume or this is Y combo. Okay got a good look wait wait a minute that looks like a down medium but that could be a low light I don't think it is that's that's so much range palm strike oh that kind of look like a Wrecker in fact this entire what the elbow and then he hits the ground just in time to catch you with another down medium this has to be the Y auto combo and then his level one super goes behind I'm not too sure how good this is going to be and he finishes behind you as well okay so if he starts on the right side he will end up on the left side that's important to keep note of you never want to give up corner carry unless you can kill the character obviously not corner carry but corner positioning and then level three let's just watch this in slow mo what is this called the super electric strike fan fiction edition boom damn that is look at how much space that takes I'm gonna be I'm super interested in what the hitbox of this is going to be like does it go up like horizontally or does it actually match up with the the circle there crazy crazy stuff obviously insane I I hope that's not super dash oh whoa whoa whoa hold on hold on hold on is this a part of the move over here android 17 falling to his knees or oh my goodness is that a part of the move or are we looking at adult gohan how many characters have I compared this man to that are top tier gaol strike this guy looks so clean he looks like um dragon ball fighters season one mash up android 17 edition you thought season one was going to be sick you better watch out for season two boy because we learn damn dropping it on all right well that's pretty much all I have to say I'm just all right let's see if they have anything to throw on here at the end android 18 entered 17 27 9 18 oh crazy it is actually the 27 I thought it was the 28 I guess I got that mixed up there not by too much obviously fighters pass you get all this all that oh that's it wild wild wild wild stuff well I'm just gonna let this run again and man I'm so excited for this this trailer was super clean um and there was a lot of stuff to look out for like he has that knee uh he has the demon elbow like thing from piccolo that wall cross-up gimmick I'm just going through it all now that that was so fat wait wait slowed down I didn't consider it but look at how fast this is there's no way you can't super dash through that I take it all back now and he hits the ground so fast please let that be like adult gohan oh my god this character so sick oh I gotta get out of here all right I gotta I gotta go ahead and get out of here let me know your thoughts on the android 17 trailer down below of course I will be linking to the actual trailer you can feel free to click on that but yeah guys make sure to let me know your thoughts down below on the android 17 trailer and if you're just excited for android 17 in general and go ahead and let me know your thoughts on what you're seeing here in terms of uh how you think this stuff's going to work out because I'm seeing some insane potential here uh just in the form of what he's able to throw out as always while you're down in the comments if you like these videos and want to see more like them from the channel make sure to hit the like button and subscribe as always I'm dato doya and I'll see you in the next one


Good morning from Lisbon and a very warm welcome to the launch of the European Drug Report 2021. This is our 26th annual report describing the drug's problem in Europe. And it's already the second that we've written and launched in the unusual circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic. We can see this morning that over 400 people have already registered to the event, so thank you very much for being with us this morning. There will be a Q&A session for journalists at the end and we will give you the instructions on how that will work in due course. We're also pleased to announce that we have interpretation available in five languages, so for those who have registered to the platform in advance, you can listen in English, French, Spanish, Portuguese or German. Should you have any technical issues during the proceedings, if you click on the info button at the bottom left of your screen, that will take you to the help desk function. Okay, so those are the housekeeping details. Now it's time to introduce the three speakers. So today we will have with us, and we're very honored to have with us the European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Mrs Yilva Johansson. She will be followed by Laura Derigo, who is a member of the EMCDDA Management Board and is chair of the Management Board representing France. And then last but not least, the EMCDDA Director who will be presenting the findings of the report. So without further ado, we will be moving to Brussels and to the European Commissioner. Thank you. So we have the Commissioner. Good morning Commissioner and welcome. Good morning. Good morning. Thank you very much. I'm very happy to be here with you today. So thank you. So please, Commissioner, you have the floor and thank you very much. Thank you. And I would like to start like this. We can only be effective if we base an act on facts. And I think that's why this report is so important. It provides a solid basis for robust actions. Drug trafficking, drug production, and drug addiction are growing concerns. Over a 10-year period, police has seized increasing amounts of drugs year after year. Drugs on all kinds and all types, from cannabis to cocaine, from methamphetamine to MDMA, from amphetamines to heroin. Pointing in part to effective police actions, the last one presented yesterday, but also to increased availability and production. The pandemic did not stop people using drugs. Youth dropped in the first few months of lockdown, but then bounced back. The pandemic at first posed obstacles for people with drug problems. Dependency, harmful use to get help. But thankfully drug services managed to innovate, providing telemedicine and distance services. The pandemic did not stop drug traffickers and dealers. They quickly adapted to lockdowns, travel restrictions, and border closures. Relying less on human couriers, more on shipping containers. Lockdown or not, the supply of cocaine to Europe continues uninterrupted. In 2019, law enforcement seized 213 tons of cocaine, more than ever before. And in Europe itself, the production of cannabis and synthetic drugs continues at a pre-pandemic level. In 2019, member states seized nearly three tons of methamphetamine. Five times more than the year before of this very addictive and very dangerous drug. The pandemic is pushing drug criminals online, reinforcing a trend. Drug dealers are moving from the streets onto social media, taking order via encrypted messaging services, sending drugs to customers via home delivery services. Drug trafficking is an organized crime. In fact, it dominates organized crime. Nearly 40% of criminal groups are engaged in drug trafficking. As the Europas recent SOCTO report shows, organized crime is a growing threat, undermining our societies, operating like multinational businesses, actually, with complex supply chains making at least 30 billion euro in drugs money every year. Undermining our economies by infiltrating legitimate businesses, subverting our societies by spreading corruption, drug criminals bribe their way across borders through airports and harbors, spreading death and destruction. Drug's crime is the most violent of all organized crimes. Traffickers compete for markets and commit arson, shootings, bombings, killing innocent victims in the crossfire. To fight this threat, we need to cut the supply of drugs by disrupting crime groups, cutting off finances, blocking supply routes in and out of Europe, supply by air, by rail or over water, offline and online, dismantling drug production and processing. Our main weapon is the strategy against organized crime I launched in April. We will boost police cooperation across borders. We will speed up and simplify operational information exchange, for example, on fingerprints and DNA and number plates. Follow the money through financial investigations and asset recovery. Fight corruption. Promote digital innovation in law enforcement. Police must always be one step ahead of the criminals. But we can only fight drugs as a criminal threat if we also understand drugs are a social issue and a healthcare issue. That's why the European Union is taking broad action based on the new EU drug strategy and upcoming action plan. Besides cutting supply, we must also reduce the demands for drugs. Through prevention, by reaching out to vulnerable people, to people most at risk, children, teenagers and young people, to help them resist drugs and live healthy lives. Through early intervention, to prevent drug use from developing interdiction and disease. Not by blaming, but by caring and helping. Aiding by society, schools, teachers, sports clubs. We need to focus on female users who face specific challenges like pregnancy, childcare, domestic violence, crime that's been increasing during the pandemic. And we need to prevent drug deaths. In 2019, more than 5000 people in the European Union died of an overdose. So we need to do much, much more. In short, we need to help people stay away from drugs, step away from drugs or to get the help and treatment they need. And we need to continue to fight the criminals. We can only make policies based on evidence, as presented in today's European Drug Report. I want to warmly, warmly thank Alexis and his team at the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction for doing an excellent job. Thank you. Thank you very much, Commissioner, for your contribution and your kind words about our work. So we'll be seeing you shortly for the Q&A session and we'll bring you back on our screens for that. So bye for now and we'll see you shortly. So next we go to Paris and to hear the thoughts of the chair of our management board, Laura D'Arigo. Laura represents France on the management board and she will be speaking in French with English subtitles. So over to Paris for Laura please. Thank you. Sur notre mode de vie, les pays d'Europe et du monde entier ont dû mettre en place des mesures sans précédent pour protéger la santé publique. Tous les aspects du phénomène de la drogue en Europe, notamment la production, le trafic, la distribution et la consommation ont également été affectés par la pandémie. Le rapport européen sur les drogues cette année fournit un aperçu actualisé de ses évolutions. Des nombreux indicateurs suggèrent que la disponibilité des drogues est très élevée en Europe. L'interception d'un nombre croissant de cargaison de cocaïne de cannabis et d'un moindre mesure d'héroïne révèle l'inquiétante infiltration de l'Europe par des groupes criminels organisés qui ont su s'adapter très rapidement aux restrictions liées à la pandémie. L'Europe est aussi devenu une zone active de production de drogue illicite notamment en ce qui concerne les produits de synthèse qui visent désormais à alimenter les marchés européens et internationales. Les plateformes en ligne, que ce soit sur le web de surface ou sur le darknet, sont des plus en plus exploités par les trafiquants de drogue. La complexité croissante du marché pose également de nouveaux défis. La disponibilité et l'usage d'un éventail plus large de substances, souvent très puissantes ou très pures, peuvent représenter des risques accrus pour la santé publique. Il est donc aujourd'hui encore plus essentiel d'unir nos forces au niveau européen et international pour identifier les évolutions rapides dans les méthodes et les vecteurs d'approvisionnement de ces produits, détecter rapidement les nouvelles substances apparaissantes sur le marché, améliorer nos connaissances des modes de consommation et les risques incurus et fournir des services adéquats à tous ceux qui en ont besoin. Mais aussi, tout mettre en œuvre pour prévenir l'usage de ces substances en renforçant notamment les compétences psychosociales des plus jeunes. Leur esprit critique, leur autonomie, leur capacité à résister lorsqu'on leur propose ces produits. La nouvelle stratégie anti-drogue de l'Union européenne pour la période 2021-2025 fournit un cadre solide et complet pour une action concertée visant à protéger et à améliorer la santé et le bien-être et à offrir un niveau élevé de sécurité. Elle réaffirme l'engagement de l'Union européenne en faveur d'une approche équilibrée et intégrée fondée sur des évidences scientifiques face à un phénomène complex. Je me rejouis que la nouvelle stratégie reconnaisse pleinement le rôle joué par l'Observatoire européen des drogues et toxicomanie qui fournit les données actualisées pour éclairer l'élaboration des politiques dans les Etats membres et offre son soutien par le biais de la détection précoce, de l'évaluation de l'aménace et des risques, de la recherche, de l'innovation et de la perspective. L'Observatoire est donc un outil précieux tant pour les décideurs que pour le professionnel. Il nous permet de confronter nos expériences et d'identifier les méthodes et les pratiques efficaces qui peuvent utilement s'adapter à d'autres contextes. Je tiens à remercier tout particulièrement le directeur de l'Observatoire et l'ensemble de son personnel pour ce rapport de grande qualité produit une fois de plus dans un context difficile. Mes remerciements vont également au point foco-nationaux, au comité scientifique de l'Agence et à tous les partenaires nationaux, européens et internationaux qui ont contribué à enrichir cette analyse. Je salue leur engagement. Les défis continuent d'évoluer, tout comme notre réponse commune. Le travail de l'Observatoire est crucial pour assurer que les politiques en matière de drogue et conduits addictives soient fondées sur la meilleure analyse possible de la réalité et contribuent ainsi à préserver la santé et la sécurité des citoyens européens. Les rapports d'aujourd'hui montrent à quel point des informations scientifiques et actualisées sont essentielles pour suivre le rythme des nouvelles menaces et pour identifier les domaines nécessitant une action rapide. C'est la valeur ajoutée évidente que l'Observatoire rapporte à l'Europe et qui devrait être renforcée dans les années à venir. Je vous remercie pour votre attention. Okay, thank you very much, Laura, for your presentation. So it's now time to give the floor to Alexi Gousdale, who will present the key findings of the report on his reflections. Thank you very much. Over to you, Alexi. Thank you very much, Cathy. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. First of all, thank you, Laura. Thank you, Commissioner, for your support. Are drugs today different from what they were 10 or 20 years ago? To answer to these questions, we present you with a comprehensive reporting package with the trends and development report, the statistical bulletin, and two supporting publications, one on benzodiazepines, the other one on the transporter report on the COVID-19 impact on the drug situation. We are facing new challenges in Europe today because of the complexity of the patterns of drug use and because of a resilient, very resilient drug market. First of all, have a look at the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Commissioner already presented some of the results. We're just compliment saying that indeed the drug market is more resilient than ever and is digitally enabled. The pandemic has boosted this tendency over the last 12 to 16 months. One sign of this is the fact that despite the pandemic, despite the lockdown, we had 46 new psychoactive substances detected last year, which means one per week, and out of the total of 830 substances we monitor through the early warning system on drugs in Europe, 400 of them appeared last year somewhere on the territory of the European Union. We also observe a shift potential between nightlife and home life. Obviously, we look for what further changes following the end of the lockdown in most of the EU member states. And finally, we have seen a huge increase in the consumption and in the detection of benzodiazepines, either legal or illicit benzodiazepines. Just to give you one idea, through the early warning system, we have detected 30 new benzos and over the last seven years, 80% of them appeared on the market. Second challenge, to illustrate what those changes mean for the society, there are three key points. The first is cannabis. The second is cocaine and then finally drug production in Europe. Talking about cannabis, the consumption remains stable, but at very high level. What is new is that we observe an increasing concentration of THC in cannabis resin that is now reaching an average of 24%, and in some cases, it goes up to 28%, while the concentration in THC of herbal cannabis is around 10%. The second point is that we see the apparition of new products coming from outside the European Union, such as edibles, which are food that is produced, including cannabis and THC, but also what are called illiquids, those liquids for vaping. Last year, in February for the first time, we detected on the European Union territory the first illiquid that is used for vaping and was containing 95% of THC. Finally, there are new risks appearing, still not fully assessed if it is a new trend or if it is something that will disappear with the apparition of herbal cannabis spread with synthetic cannabinoids, which increase dramatically the potential risk for intoxication for the users. And then, of course, we have CBD products and low THC, that remain an important challenge in many member states. Let's have a look now at cocaine. For cocaine, the commissioner highlighted the fact that we have a record of seizures in 2019 and 2020. What we also observe is that there is an increased purity. Over the last 10 years, the purity of cocaine has increased by 57%. What we also see is that the EU is becoming in a transshipment area, which means part of the huge quantities of cocaine entering in Europe are continuing to the Middle East and to Asia. And then, finally, it's important to highlight that, yes, there is an increased use of cocaine in the European Union, thus there is a period of latency that can go up to eight, nine years between the moment someone starts using and then needs and goes for asking for help and for treatment. We cannot yet see the full impact of this increase of use, except that increasingly in many cities, we see an increase in the consumption of crack cocaine. The third challenge is created by the drug production in Europe that is becoming more important. In 2019, 370 laboratories were detected and dismantled. We observe a high-strength MDMA between being produced, MDMA, or ecstasy. 20 years ago, we launched an alert for the elephant pills that contain 60 milligrams. Today, the average content is around 180, and in five cities, we detected up to 370 milligrams of MDMA in those pills. But we see also an increase in the production of amphetamine and in the recent years, a dramatic increase in the production of methamphetamine. Most of them for export to other regions of the world, but of course, with the risk for an increased consumption in the European Union. And this is why there is a harmful potential for health. So what are the consequences, the likely consequences of that? I think we are just in front of the potential perfect storm. Huge pressure from the market on the consumers to increase the number of consumers and increase the quantities being consumed. The post-COVID-19 economic recession will have a dramatic impact on the already most vulnerable populations. The negative impact of COVID and lockdown on the mental health of the population in general, again, impacting, especially the vulnerable groups. And then the risk for involvement of more young people in drug-related directly or indirectly criminal activities. And the commissioner mentioned very rightly, drug-related violence, corruption, and finally, we cannot forget the risk for the environment. In a summary, today, the drugs are everywhere. People using substances or presenting an addiction behavior are everyone. Everyone of us can, at some stage in his or her life, having experience of a use or abuse or dependence on substances. And this is one of the key changes compared with 30 years ago. Today, drug use and people who are using drugs are not only corresponding to the profile of the more classical person injecting heroin. It covers a much broader range of situations, so we need to adjust and adapt our policies to that new reality. And also, it's reflected by the fact that everything can be used as a drug today. So what can we do? We need to do the right thing. The first thing is to implement the use strategy and the action plan that will be adopted in a few weeks' time. And this strategy is very important because it's based on the fundamental rights the heart of the European values that are part of the Lisbon Treaty and that mean that everybody in Europe has the right to appeal for the respect of their fundamental rights, including people who are using drugs. The second point is the balanced approach, combining law enforcement, public security and safety together with public health. Some people like to oppose and to say, you need one or those, no. They are like this liquid yin and yang. If you push one policy only in one direction, it can only lead to a disruptive scenario. And finally, the drug services need to make sure that there will be not those who will pay the bill for the cost of the COVID-19 pandemic. So together, let's make sure that we are ready for the next one. Over to you. Thank you very much, Alexi. So now we're going to open the session for the questions and answers and we're going to bring the commissioner back from Brussels. So I'll just give you the instructions on how the question and answer will work. In the top left of your screen, you have an icon which says Agenda. So if you click on that, that will take you to the agenda where at the bottom you'll see questions and answers for journalists. Click on that, and then you have a button which says Ask a Question. And if you could write your questions in English, and obviously for those who have registered, you will have the interpretation for that. So yes, and if you could please write your name, your media organization, and for whom the question is addressed. So now if we can bring the commissioner back on our screens, hopefully that will work. Yes, that's great. Welcome back, commissioner. So the commissioner will stay for two questions. She has another engagement, so we will begin with the questions for the commissioner. So the first one that we received is from a specialized magazine in Portugal called Revista Dependencias, and it's from Sergio Olivaida. And his question is, what can the EU do to best combat drug trafficking? So over to you, commissioner. Thank you. Thank you. There is actually a lot we can do, and there's a lot we are doing already, but we can of course step up. I think it's a good example as what was presented yesterday. Yesterday at Europol together with FBI, the Swedish police, the Dutch police, and also six other member states presented a very sophisticated and huge operation called the Trojan Shield, which already have, where they have this encrypted mobile phones and they have been following high-level criminal groups for 18 months, and they could now arrest already 800 people, and they have seized already 32 tons of drugs and a lot of money, a lot of other things, and they have prevented a lot of murders. So I think this kind of police cooperation, a sophisticated police cooperation, is the most important way to fight the illicit trafficking and dealing with drugs. And that's to facilitate that. I presented in April an organized crime strategy, and that contains how we can facilitate a better and smoother and swifter police cooperation. For example, Europol have now, we have proposed a new mandate for Europol so that they can process big data. For example, it is Trojan Shield, they have 27 million messages. To deal with that huge amount of data, many member states do not have that capacity themselves. That's why Europol come in and can help member states to process big data. We have also proposed a swifter exchange of information that will come later this year with a renew so-called PROOM decision so that police can easier find whether there are a hit in another police register in another member state, for example on DNA or fingerprints or maybe even photos that we should put into that. I will later this year present the new EU police cooperation code to set a European standard for police cooperation. We have also proposed that Europol should have an innovation lab where you can use the latest technology and develop new tools to fight high-level criminal groups. My colleague Murad McGinnis will later come this month with a package to fight money laundering which is also very important to fight the drug smuggling. So these are examples on how we can... We're already doing a lot what that was presented yesterday with this very successful cooperation also with the US, but also what we can do more to facilitate police cooperation. I will later this month come to Lisbon to meet with my counterparts in the US administration, the US Secretary for Homeland Security and the Attorney General. And of course this will also be an area where we will exchange views on how we can better cooperate between the European Union and US in this aspect. Thank you. Okay, thank you very much Commissioner. So the second question that we have for you again from the same journalist is how do you see the role of the EMCDDA evolving to counter drugs in the EU in future? Well first the agency is already doing an excellent job. I must say that and it's very appreciated by Member States. So it's important that the agency can continue doing what they are doing but we are of course also looking into areas where we can strengthen and broadening the mandate for the agency. Areas that we are looking into are for example if there could be a role for the agency to have a real-time monitoring of the drugs market. So being able to give their latest update in real-time to Member States how the drug market is evolving and that's an area where there could be a use of the special expertise from the agency to help Member States to be prepared and to act and police forces in different Member States. We are also looking into whether there can be a role for the agency to look, the forward-looking role to help also what we heard here from Alexis saying that there's one new drug being identified every week one new substance being identified every week. So a little bit forecasting what is probably going to happen in the drug markets and helping Member States to prepare and to prevent when new drugs for example probably will be introduced into the European drug market. So these are areas we are looking into whether we can strengthen the mandate for the agency but I also would like to stress that they are already doing an excellent job but should also be able to continue what they are already doing. Okay thank you very much Commissioner for your contributions. We know you have to leave us now but we hope to see you again soon in Lisbon and thank you for being with us today. So see you soon. Thank you. Thank you Commissioner. So we have a few more questions that have just come in on the iPad. So the next one I'm going to read out is from Inder Bugarin from an El Universal in Mexico. He has a cannabis question for Alexi which is cannabis is the most widely used illicit substance among Europeans and year after year we see an increase in the THC content. The same goes for adulterated cannabis alerts are on the rise. Isn't it just better to regulate like in the United States? Does the EMCDDA have the elements to conclude if the American model is successful or not? Thank you very much Inder. Muchas gracias. I think it's a very good question that illustrates what is the complexity of drug policy today because actually it's not only a question of being either illicit or illicit. There is a set of questions that need to be addressed whatever the political option that is taken. What the EMCDDA has done we have published in January a special report analyzing drug policies in the Americas which means not only in the US but in Canada, in Uruguay for instance the report stresses that not only there is a variety of regulatory models in the Americas but you have a total of 11 alternatives to a pure prohibitionist approach. So it's also the report illustrates that what matters is to define as much as possible on the basis of evidence what is the stated objective of the policy and then also the report highlights the fact that it's extremely important to define what will be the criteria for evaluating the impact and preferably to have a first assessment of the situation before the legislative change is being made. We at EMCDDA our role is to provide and support the evidence highlight also what are the policy issues that need to be addressed independently from the final choice and we also of course provide full support to the member states and we follow the situation also inside the EU and I would like finally to highlight that the alternative to extreme prohibition is not only legalization you can see for instance in Portugal they have 20 years of experience of decriminalization of the use of any substances that is an integrated part of a more comprehensive national drug policy that in 2016 at the Jungas was confirmed by the INCB as being fully compatible with the UN conventions so we have a lot of things to learn from a lot of things to follow and we will continue to do so providing full support to the EU member states and the EU institutions. Okay thank you Alexi so the next question that we have is from Rory Watson who's a freelance journalist in Brussels this is a UK related question and there are a few others coming in on the chat on this subject but his question is what is the downside of the UK absence in your work and is there any chance of the UK joining the EMCDDA again or participating in its work in the future? Well thank you Rory for the question that's a very painful point for us at EMCDDA as you know we first have lost because of Brexit a broad range of excellent fantastic experts and colleagues including the national focal points to the EMCDDA there were two eminent scientists from the UK that were members of the scientific committee of the Centre we are also losing the direct access to very useful data whether on new psychoactive substances or on toxicity or on recusing the general population especially the information regarding people who are in treatment where the data sets are of very high quality in the UK and also the situation regarding drug related death is extremely worrying in the UK in particular in England and in Scotland and we are losing this connection and this daily dialogue including in the context of the early warning system on new psychoactive substance so for the moment I'm not able to tell you if and when the UK may be back in this EMCDDA and RETOX family of course we would be very pleased to start again the cooperation with them but this is a matter that is part of the relationship between the EU and the UK and I'm afraid that the initiative first should come from the UK towards the EU if they are interested to come back in our family okay thank you Alexi the next question comes from Politico Europe from Carlo Martuccelli and his question is on the point of economic recessions what do we know about the link between economic recession and increased drug use thank you that's a very challenging question indeed there are different ways in which the economic recession can have an impact on drug use first of all the fact that people who had access to substances of better or higher quality may not have the means the financial means anymore to access those substances could push them towards the use of more toxic and more dangerous and potentially more lethal substances that's that's one of the likely or possible impact another possibility is that people who are already suffering for some vulnerabilities being social or psychological vulnerabilities may be facing an even more difficult situation because of the economic recession because they would lose their job there is also the impact of the pandemic on the mental health in the population which could push them towards substance use that was not the case before for them and again as the report shows there is an increase in the use of an availability of plenty of substances we have mentioned benzodiazepines certainly there is a topic that we need to follow and continue to monitor that's also the case for other substances that are more chemical or synthetic and finally the third risk is that people from social economical vulnerable groups may be pushed by the crisis to find alternative sources of income a bit on the model of the county lines that we have seen first in the UK and that have spread to other countries in the EU in which organized crime groups are using young people to push and convey the drugs from the big cities to the rural areas so there is a potential risk of involvement of some people in more criminal activities thank you very much Alexi so the next question comes from Germany from Deutsche Welle the question is you state that drugs are everywhere and that harm reduction should be at the core of drug policy and further keeping in mind that people who are using drugs enjoy rights as well is there any way to deal with drugs other than criminal decriminalization and legal legalization coupled with strong regulation thank you for the question that's that's one of the things that have appeared as being a top question during the pandemic and I'm sure this will remain a very important question at the level of the European Union for the years to come and I would say there is one word for me that illustrates both the challenges and the way we can answer to them and its co-production it's inclusive policies and it's the fact that in many instances sometimes for the first time during the pandemic the clients from the treatment services or from the harm reduction programs have been considered as partners like the medical director of a program in Bergamo was saying in one of our webinars he explained that because the centers were closed or could not deliver the same services to their clients they reached a gentleman agreement with their clients I think if we are capable in the European Union to see people who are using drugs learning the lesson that people who are using drugs is not only the injecting in users who also deserve to be associated and involved but more broadly many other people need to be associated to have better services including better harm reduction services and the message we receive from the field is twofold the first is most of the result and positive results during or despite the pandemic they have not been the effect of only the effort of people working in the drugs field but also is the result for other social programs that's one of the message we receive from associations of professionals like Unath in Spain and the second thing as I said is that both everybody people who are using drugs and the people from the services would like to see that a lot of the innovations that have appeared during the pandemic will not be lost in the post-COVID but also learning from the lessons from the last economic crisis caused by the subprime they want to make sure that they are not going to pay the bill for the COVID-19 pandemic okay thank you Lexi the next question comes from Spain so it's from El País Andrés Morenza and he would like to know there is an increase in the variety and origins of criminal groups involved in drug trafficking in Europe is there any discussion about equating or normalizing the penal codes of the different European countries for mafia criminal groups or narco trafficking groups so is there any discussion about equating or normalizing the penal codes of different countries for mafia criminal groups narco trafficking which is very good question too and I can link the question and my answer to what was presented by the commissioner first of all the EU has adopted recently the European strategy on organized crime and on security which is aiming at joining the efforts and coordinating the efforts to fight organized crime all over Europe and as the commissioner said and as was presented by our colleagues from Europe all yesterday it's global and cooperation has to be global and international and there are of course a lot of obstacles to that still there is one limitation at the European level is that most of the competences are in the hands of the member states with full respect of subsidiarity and of the choice and the political orientations in each country so I'm not sure it is the goal to have a single penal approach but over the last 25 years there have been plenty of initiatives to be closer and to have a joint approach for instance it's about the minimum penalties for drug trafficking that have been agreed between the member states already more than 10 years ago so very important steps have been made in that direction today one of the challenges are associated to the cyber crime and the increasing involvement of internet and the dark net in drug trafficking and in organized crime in general and it is linked to two points the first one is about of course the issue of encryption encryption is essential for all EU citizens we cannot present encryption only as a problem that's the guarantee we need as citizens that our personnel and health data or financial data are well protected at the same time the challenge for the organizations fighting against organized crime is that encryption should not be give the highway of total impunity for organized crime and thanks to the Troy and Orr's operation that was presented yesterday there are initiatives that have been taken the second challenge is that because of the ever-growing importance of internet based or dark net based criminality the importance and the challenge is to be able to not only to find evidence of the criminal activities but also to find a way to decide from which jurisdiction those offenses or those crimes are depending and this is one of the projects objectives on which our colleagues from Eurojust and together with Europol and other agencies and other international organizations and the member states are working for the moment thank you Alexi we have a follow-up question from Politico Europe from Carlo Matuccelli again so he's asking can you elaborate please on how drug traffickers and drug dealers adapted to restrictions using digital tools okay that's a very interesting case because this is first something we learn not first hand second hand what we have observed last year there were two phases the first one of course brutal lockdown in most or if not all the EU member states or at least not exactly at the same time which means at some stage nobody in the streets a lot of controls even more than before so circulation more difficult very difficult situation for homeless people who could not stay in the street very difficult situation for those who live in or from the street and therefore also difficulty for dealers and there what we have seen and what was reported including through the focus group the online focus groups we organized and the web survey is the fact that they found new and innovative ways to continue to deal without while reducing the risks it's a kind of harm reduction from the side of dealers which means for instance agreeing to through messenger or encrypted messaging to about what is the place where the drug will be made available and then exchanging the GPS coordinates so there was no physical presence concomitant physical presence at the same place with the product or with the dose that was bought here what I think it's important to realize is these examples are illustrating once more that we don't speak about only one type of people who are using drugs because those who are most vulnerable they don't have any smartphone they don't have easy account to access to internet or on the dark net so also for harm reduction interventions the services were sometimes using a basic telephone but you can do a lot of things and be helpful so for some part of the public that is using substances of course with an access to internet to some messaging a telegram or signal or any others they made their way to find out where they can get their dose some dealers and even some NGOs have been encouraging people to stockpile the quantities they would need in advance of the pandemic so this was during the first phase after that what we have seen is partly a dematerialization of the deals which mean electronic payment not no cash because in any case this was not possible or too risky to circulate with the amount of money in the street with that cash and we have seen also later when business was becoming again a bit as usual that some of those new ways of dealing and doing business on drugs have remained still there is a huge diversity and I think that as we talk also about a huge variety of different populations and vulnerable populations we certainly cannot conclude that now everything will be fully digitalized for everybody and certainly there will be alternative solutions and I would say what I expect is that in the coming two three years at least this will be still a kind of a hybrid mode where there are benefits for the side of the dealers and some groups of users to continue to use more digital services certainly they will not go backwards but there is a certain part or substantial part or proportion of the customers that has difficult access to those services and certainly from the side of the dealers and producers they don't want to lose that market so they will adopt also some kind of a mix model Okay thank you Alexi so we have two questions from the Netherlands coming up in two from Portugal so I'll take the first one from the Netherlands which is from Marco Visser from the Dutch national newspaper Trou he says is it possible to decrease the demand for drugs to zero and if not what is an acceptable level of drug use That's the five euros or ten euros question a difficult question thank you for the question I think first of all what the evidence shows us the last 25 or 30 years since the MCDDA was created and since we collect and monitor the situation is that a world without any use of anything is just not possible because it's not only about the offer and the demand it's about we human being how we deal and cope with different situations so the question is total full eradication I think at least the level of the European member states this is not considered as something really likely the most of the policies including the EU strategy strive for a reduction of drug use and reduction of the negative consequences both for people who are using drugs and for the citizens and for the population for the rule of law but the full eradication is I would say the ultimate hope but certainly not a short-term objective so and what we also observe is that what is considered as normal today by some citizens some people using drugs up to five or 10 or two years ago was not considered as normal was not yet mainstream and what we see is that the market is changing very much so both the market influences the users and the users and patterns of use are also partly having an influence on the market you come from the Netherlands under the Dutch presidency there was a meeting of the national drug coordinators in Amsterdam and we had a meeting including a visit to a coffee shop and it was very interesting to learn from the manager of the coffee shop that while some of the users coming to the coffee shop have the choice with the range of different varieties and potencies especially those who come who came from abroad were systematically choosing those with the highest potency so this trend is something that we see for many substances many addictive behaviors we don't have a perfect explanation why is it so but certainly it contributes if people were not buying those substances today or maybe tomorrow the dealers would configure a different offer of products to meet those needs so I'm afraid there is no simple or easy answer to that certainly what is important is also to base as much as possible the assessment of the risks and the assessment of what we consider as being acceptable or not based on facts and on evidence still and I will finish on that what is extremely worrying to us is the fact that and again I think it's because the when we speak about drugs people think only about the old image of the injecting heroin user as 30 years ago that a lot of people who have a real addiction problem don't see they have it and spontaneously they can tell you yeah I'm not injecting heroin so what are you talking about so I think the challenge here is there is a reduced perception of the risks in some parts of the population that is based on wrong assessments and and the huge availability of drugs today that is the you just availability ever calls for more and more appropriate better prevention programs together and in each and every country okay thank you Alexi so we have another question from the Netherlands this time from Stephen Kompier who's a freelance journalist he says is there any increase in the use of crystal meth in the EU lots of labs are being found for example in the Netherlands another emerging problem in the EU the the methamphetamine the labs and thank you for raising this question because there is a very interesting figure I inform you that there were 370 labs that had been dismantled in 2019 out of those 370 there were 267 labs that were for methamphetamine and if I'm not wrong in 2019 there were 8 or 9 of those labs that were found in the Netherlands and last year there were 32 so what we can say about this is from the seizures from the cross indicator the analysis we conduct it seems that most of the production so far but not all of it is going to Asia Oceania but also to the Middle East including there have been a few big seizures of pills that were being sold as Cap-Tagon even we know that actually this is not the same substance as the real chemical Cap-Tagon as it was in the past so having said that one of the biggest concerns again is in the front or at the eve or a much bigger economic recession than what we have had in 2008 following the subprime the potential for a push from the market from the producer to make available crystal meth in Europe to the weakest or most vulnerable potential customers is a risk that we should not underestimate okay thank you so we have two more questions left and that will probably take us to the time that we have the next question is from so both are from Portugal the next question is again from Revista Dependencias and they say in 2020 46 new drugs were detected in the EU what characteristics do they present and in which groups do they belong? thank you I think it's a oh no so amigo Sergio gave you a ultimate question with obrigado I think it is very interesting to see what is the overall composition of those substances detected if you look to the report you will see that the various categories of substances there is an evolution over the years and that's one of the points that makes us believe we can much we can meet the requirements presented by the commissioner by saying that we need to be able also to look forward to have some forecasts to maybe maybe not predict but explain what we expect to be maybe one of the next tricks what do I say that because I mentioned the increase in the discovery of new benzodiazepines or fake benzodiazepines on the European market but if you look at the different groups of substances that were discovered last year they are psychostimulants they are some hallucinogens but here for answering more concretely to you I would take the example of the synthetic opioids until three to four years ago we have the biggest problem we are with the category family of opioids that are called the fentanyls and you probably know that fentanyls are killing still last year were killing between 60,000 and 70,000 people in the US in the EU today if we look at the data from the early warning system talking only about the new substances only one of the 10 synthetic opioids was a fentanyl which probably reflects some impact of the legislative measures that have been taken at EU level with the support and contribution of the EMCDD early warning system but also for instance the measures that have been requested by the EU and by the US to China as most of the fentanyls are and were coming from China but what we see is that there are new molecules of synthetic opioids that are appearing on the market and frequently we first detect them through the early warning system before some of them may become or not mainstream so those changes and I send you back to the report to have the precise number for each group and subgroup of those substances but it illustrates that we still have a lot of psychostimulants a lot of synthetic cathinones some of them being injected and this allows me to highlight the fact that injecting drugs is not only associated to error in use of course injecting drug use has reduced dramatically in Europe but it still exists and today it doesn't cover or relates only to error in use it's about cathinones in some cases even if it is very minor proportion you have people who are injecting cocaine for instance so certainly we need to keep an eye on the possible evolution knowing that the availability and the purity of heroin for instance is also dramatically increasing in the last two, three years Okay, thank you so we have one question we have time for one question at the end so this one actually comes from a Portuguese NGO not from a journalist this time it comes from Rui Coimbra who is from Casa Portugal he says great event thanks what can be the role of users in managing and building their own and their community's health so what can be the role of users in managing and building their own health and their community's health well I think thank you Rui for the question I think it's a key point that relates to what I said about one of the key lessons learned from the pandemic we knew it already before but the pandemic or during the pandemic it has showed it was even more important it's about the inclusive policies and the inclusion of the clients or people who are using drugs as partners in the design and implementation of the services and I was participating in one seminar organized by another Portuguese NGO online a webinar a few weeks ago and one of the topics that were discussed about also how could we we at national or at European level provide some kind of certification or yes, certificate of education to people who are using drugs to allow them to be included in the organization and provision of services I know that's one of the questions you have been discussing in Portugal it has been discussed in other countries one of the things EMCDD also is exploring for the moment after consultation and dialogue with some national or European networks including the correlation network are raised the possibility or at least to explore the possibility to associate people who are using drugs from those different programs to a training about scientific writing it may look a bit surprising or maybe ridiculous but not at all because actually one of the key messages that we received from people who are using drugs and for some of the main actors in those community based programs is the fact that it's very difficult for them to have an access to publication in scientific journals and this is why I offered to study to explore the possibility and to see how we could help them to write better or to get support to scientific writing to allow them to better share their experience also in the scientific journals because they contribute significantly to improve the evidence and the last example I would like to give you and I'm very very proud that we at EMCDD we started these three years ago is the fact that for some of our publications now we consult, we associate people from the field including some people who are using drugs before we finalize the publications and before we launch them the next example will be at the end of this year when we are going to launch the next European guide on health and social responses so certainly we are going to meet again very soon okay thank you very much so we've come to the end of the Q&A so we're out of time now so if you've submitted your question through the platform and you haven't had an answer yet we'll get back to you on those questions during the day and also if you have further questions throughout the day please do send them to press at emcdda.europa.eu and we'll get back to you on that we do have a team of experts at hand today who are answering questions according to their subject area and language groups so we hope to be able to help you throughout the day so thank you all for having joined us thank you to our distinguished guests speakers thank you also to our technicians and of course the interpreters and everybody who helped to put this event together so for now that's goodbye from Lisbon, Paris and Brussels hope to see you again next year and the press conference is now closed thank you very much thank you, bye bye, obrigado you


The benefits of eating raw vegetables are the same for anybody. Fruit and vegetables are the cornerstone of a healthy diet and they will lower the risk of many chronic diseases including cancer, diabetes and heart disease. Raw foods are foods that are uncooked but also it's foods that have been minimally processed. So most foods that are eaten raw are going to be plant based foods. If you looked at a person's normal diet after on raw food it will contain plenty of fruits and vegetables as its basis. Some people may choose to eat some raw meat foods maybe our sushi for example would be eaten but by far plant foods will make up the 90% of the foods that a person has on their plate. Here I'm going to make brautiging. We have some bloomed wild rice which we've soaked overnight in the dehydrator, some sprouted buckwheat which we've soaked and sprouted for 24 hours and then dehydrated for another 48. Now I'm just going to mix those two together and that's going to be our couscous. We have some fresh vegetables, we toss in salt then we place in the dehydrated to dry them off and that will give us this which is a vegetable with a cooked appearance as well as a cooked texture and I'm going to add some sprouted chickpeas and then just some Moroccan sauce. Before humans discovered fire all of our food was eaten raw and one of the reasons why we've probably done so well as a species is that when you start a cooking food we actually increase the amount of foods we could eat and we increase the digestibility of food allowing us to grow bigger and stronger and dominate the planet. If you only eat raw foods you limit the amount of nutrients that you eat. There is a risk of deficiencies if you become too focused on particular foods and importantly if you only eat raw foods you exclude some really beneficial foods that are good for our health. Legumes for example they are strongly linked with a reduction of many chronic diseases but if you eat raw foods you won't be eating beans or lentils or peas. When you eat food you do destroy some of the proteins and enzymes in them but so too when you eat the foods that's what your stomach acid does as well. Cooking food can make food healthier. Number one and most importantly when you cook food you kill off a lot of microbes that can give you food poisoning and number two when you cook food you can actually increase the absorption of certain nutrients so it's not all bad news. Cooking food is a safe way to treat food it can actually improve nutrition in certain cases. The raw food diet message actually has many positives in it. If it's encouraging someone to eat more raw natural-based plant foods that's going to be good for their diet but our biggest health problem in a country like Australia is we don't need enough fruit and vegetables to start with. Whether they're cooked or raw is probably a moot point.