The International Network of People who Use Drugs (INPUD) is a global peer-based organisation advocating for the health and rights of people who use drugs. An important part of this advocacy work is to increase community and civil society engagement with UN Human Rights mechanisms. In most countries, women and gender-diverse people who use drugs are often invisible and marginalised. Additionally, they are disproportionately affected by criminal laws and punitive legal frameworks that stigmatise people who use drugs. The United Nations Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) is an international human rights treaty established to monitor and defend the human rights of women, addressing discrimination against women.

This Technical Brief provides guidance on how women who use drugs in countries that have ratified CEDAW can effectively engage with the treaty body that monitors its implementation. CEDAW can be used by organisations, networks, and coalitions led by or representing women and gender-diverse people who use drugs to advocate for the protection of their rights, address human rights violations specific to these communities, and amplify the specific impacts of drug policies on women, gender-diverse, and gender non-conforming people who use drugs. The Technical Brief provides an overview of CEDAW and outlines the procedures and steps on how activists can engage effectively with its processes. The Technical Brief highlights opportunities to use CEDAW processes outcomes to demand accountability in addressing human rights violations of women who use drugs.