To add to my colleagues' words on this, I think there is an essential misunderstanding of what's meant by the words “harm reduction”. I think most of medicine is harm reduction. A person with diabetes who receives treatment for diabetes is in the throes of harm reduction interventions. When you educate people about diabetes, about heart disease, this is harm reduction being done.
I almost wish we had a new phrase for it, because it's just so core to the practice of medicine, it just doesn't quite....
It isn't easy to understand how it became such a political item.