Grant: Planning Grants - Priority Announcement: International Research Collaborations

In recent decades, the relationship between drugs and violence has become an international public health issue that spans disciplines and geographical boundaries. To understand how licit and illicit drug use contributes to violent behaviour, it is important to understand the mechanisms by which drugs affect human behaviour. It is also important to assess the gender-related impact within the general experience of violence in order to better understand the drug and violence nexus. This proposal is seeking financial support for a meeting between representatives of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control commission (CICAD) of the Organization of American States (OAS) and member states from Central and South America as well as the Caribbean, to facilitate the process of conducting research with some of these member states on the topic of drug use and domestic violence. The funds requested will allow representatives from the participating countries that have submitted a letter of commitment (as attached), CICAD and CAMH to come together to discuss the logistics of such a study, to develop research appropriate and applicable methodologies and protocol's and a data collection instrument that will form the basis of the first phase of the study, and to develop a research proposal that will be submitted for funding to an appropriate granting agency that will be chosen at this meeting. This work will result in consensus building for the representatives from each country, and commitment to engage in the project. We anticipate that we will also be form a critical basis for building research capacity in each country. We will also work with researches from each country in terms of any research assistance and support they may require. There will be important linkages created between researches in Latin America and Canada, thus allowing us to engage in collaborations that will be of significant mutual benefit.