10 seconds is the average time it takes crack cocaine to reach a human brain. The intense high lasts from 5 to 15 minutes. With over one million users, Brazil has the dubious distinction of having the highest number of crack-cocaine users in the world. Cracolândia, in São Paulo, is the symbolic epicenter of the battle against crack. The historic city center has been taken over by crack addicts since 1989, and smoking crack is currently defacto legalized in a city block nicknamed "The Fluxo". After repeated failed government initiatives that used forced dissipation techniques and mandatory hospitalizations, the municipal government has started a new approach: it gives janitorial jobs, hotel rooms and food here to over 400 addicts without requiring them to leave the drug. Some of these photographs have been published by The Guardian and VICE Magazine. This project was supported by an International Reporting Project health and development grant.
A crack addict stands with his crack pipe and lighter hung from his neck. Brazil has the dubious distinction of having the highest number of crack-cocaine users in the world, last estimated at one million people. Within Brazil, São Paulo’s Cracolândia is highly symbolic of the country’s drug epidemic.
São Paulo’s historic city center been taken over by crack cocaine addicts since the late 1980s. Smoking crack is defacto legalized in an area nicknamed the Fluxo (on the right of the image). The drug reaches the city via micro-traffickers – highly mobile individuals who carry small quantities of crack cocaine. At points in its history, one could find up to 2,000 addicts wandering the streets of Cracolândia. Today’s estimates are closer to five hundred.
In January of 2014, São Paulo’s government set up a harm reduction program called De Braços Abertos (Open Arms). It provides over 400 crack addicts with hotel rooms, janitorial jobs and food without requiring them to leave the drug. An addict who is part of the program sits on a bench while a police officer patrols the area. Most of the people arrested, usually outside the program area, are small-scale traffickers.
Priscila Pareschi, an addict part of De Braços Abertos program, chills in the program’s tent on a weekday afternoon. Pareschi ran away from her home when she was 16 and started using crack. She’s been addicted since. Before joining De Braços Abertos and getting a hotel room, Pareschi was like many others homeless in these streets. She sees the housing as a first step to get her life back together. “To sleep in a sidewalk…There ain’t a place to take a shower, don’t have clothes, don’t have anything,†she said. “One day I woke up and someone was kicking me. Someone I never saw in my life. I was pregnant with my son, I have other kidsâ€.
Police cameras monitor the area 24/7 from a van positioned right next to the Fluxo. Soon after this initiative started, addicts started using curtains to hide dealing and block the view of the cameras. Brazil has an immense, porous border with coca-producing nations Colombia, Peru and Bolivia. In small Brazilian towns close to the border, often in home kitchens, coca paste is transformed into impure yellowish crack rocks. The supply chain is nearly impossible for law enforcement to trace.
An officer watches over the Fluxo, where users can openly consume. The writing on the van says ‘It is possible to win the battle against crack’. Almost two hundred armed police are stationed nearby, on the lookout for traffickers and purse-snatchers. Until early 2014, most governmental actions regarding Cracôlandia residents have been coercive: involuntary hospitalization, violent police interventions, and forced dissipation techniques. This has recently changed, partially because crack is a hot-button issue in Brazil and voters demand the end of Cracôlandia. The police have unofficially declared crack users “sick people†instead of criminals, but buying and selling is illegal.
Eloisa de Sousa Arruda, Secretary of Justice in the state of São Paulo, is one of the many political figures involved in trying to tackle the problem. Some of the approaches by different political forces reflect opposing views. While the state advocates for methods that are treatment-intensive, like detox programs and religious therapeutic communities, the city advocates for a harm reduction approach. Both forces want to kick addicts out of the city center. Many addicts say they’re here to stay. Fernando Haddad, São Paulo’s mayor and the champion of De Braços Abertos is firm about the end of Cracolândia: “It is almost a matter of honor to recover the heart of the cityâ€. A real state commercial and residential plan is being sketched for this urban area.
Two addicts sit by a poster that says “See equality in a world of differences†in an NGO and community center called É de Lei that works with recovering crack addicts. “When I started working in Cracolândia in 2004 the main issue for us was that Cracolândia was invisible for society,†Bruno Gomes, the coordinator of this center, said. “Ten years later, each government that comes to power here in the city of São Paulo tries to show to the general population that they can do something against this enemy, against the crack. Their goal is the public opinion, not only the crack users, you know?â€
A statue with no hand at sunset in a square taken over by military police in the heart of Cracolândia. William Thomaz, Military Police Liutenant of São Paulo State and coordinator of an operation here called New Light Operation (Nova Luz Operação), said crack addicts had stolen the copper statue’s hand to resell for drugs. He’s in charge of an initiative aimed at, among other things, changing the police aggressive behavior with the addicts.
The feed of one of the police cameras monitoring The Fluxo 24/7. Crack using is openly permitted within The Fluxo, an area that occupies the equivalent of a city block. It is plentiful and cheap enough in Cracôlandia – a hit costs as little as 5 Brazilian reais, or US$2 – to satisfy demands of low-income drug users.
Police officers take a break inside the van that monitors The Fluxo 24/7. When officers have enough proof to arrest someone for dealing, they’ve learned the lesson to do it a few blocks away from The Fluxo to avoid heavy confrontations with the users. Only very small-scale traffickers are usually arrested.
Missing people signs plague Cracôlandia. When any relatives go missing in other parts of the state of São Paulo, their family members come here looking for them. There are other Cracôlandias in Brazil, but São Paulo’s is the most notorious.
Patricia Alves, an addict part of the De Braços Abertos program, was a photographer working at a commercial center before she ended up in Cracôlandia seven years ago. She did so after falling in love with a man who was addicted to crack. Her daughter disappeared one day while they were sleeping in the street. She sees having her own room like a luxury she’s thankful for. "De Braços Abertos trusted us. It gave us an opportunity, which many didn’t do,†she said.
A graffiti that says “vida loca†(crazy life) painted in a De Braços Abertos hotel room. Despite the heavy government intervention, drug traffickers still control much of everyday life in Cracôlandia. For instance, the hotels are known to be rife with illegal activity. Though the hotels are sponsored by the city, the police need warrants to enter – and almost never do. “We all know [the hotels] are horrible places,†said William Thomaz, lieutenant of Cracôlandia’s military police unit. “It’s like ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’.
The program has a tent where addicts can gather to watch TV, sleep and socialize.
A supervisor reviews the trash bin of a crack addict woman after a morning of work at the De Braços Abertos galpon. He notices it’s not completely clean, and the woman leans over the bin to get the trash left. Addicts in the program sweep the city center a few hours per day in exchange for a modest weekly salary that they can spend on drugs if they so wish.
Health workers talk to addicts outside one of the eight De Braços Abertos hotels. The program has over 400 participants and there are plans to expand it to more.
An empty building next to The Fluxo where the state government has started construction of a program called Restart. Only the first two floors, where there are doctors, a barbershop and a gym for addicts, are operative now during limited hours.
A magazine whose cover story reads “Crack: the open-mouthed monster†sits in the living room of Nildes Nery, a female pastor who works with crack addicts in Cracôlandia. “Throughout all these years I’ve been here, I’ve seen many things, deaths, fights,†said Nery. “Cracôlandia is like that, a hard place. A hard place to work, to live, to relate. But I say that in the middle of the crack rocks, I can find also precious gems.â€
Priscila Xavier Carolino, 29, nine-month-pregnant and almost due with her fifth child, in her room in one of the De Braços Abertos hotels. She has been living in Cracôlandia for over a year. Like many bellied women here, Priscila’s pregnancy is considered high risk. Pregnant women here often lose their babies to the state because mothers are deemed homeless. Priscila faced this threat. She was finally able to keep her baby through the help of De Braços Abertos, who argued that her hotel room and participation in the program made her fit to raise a child. Priscila's brothers were killed when she was younger. She was in two physically abusive relationships, which caused her to eventually flee her hometown of Rio de Janeiro and come to São Paulo.
‘A happy day is so rare’ – a message on Priscila Xavier Carolino’s hotel room wall.
Two police cars are stationed right in front of The Fluxo. The area becomes especially tense on Friday evenings after the De Braços Abertos hotel residents get paid. The visitors influx also increases during weekends and nights. Many people come from the outskirts of the city and have regular jobs, families and lives.
Flip flops drying in the hotel room of two female crack addicts. Women crack users have an even tougher time here. “They usually have sex in exchange for crack. A lot of men like to go there because the women are easy and cheap, and you can do with them all you want. So they suffer a lot of violence," explained Bruno Gomes, who heads the NGO É de Lei.
Flavia Castro do Britto, 39, a participant of the De Braços Abertos program, in her hotel room. Flavia worked as a hairdresser for 20 years before she lost her apartment and her job after leaving an abusive relationship with a man who got her addicted to crack. “The street isn’t easy. The first week [in the hotel] I had a backache because my body wasn’t used to a mattress,†she said. Other than smoking and not seeing her children regularly, Flavia seems content with her life today. “I don’t pay to eat, I don’t pay to sleep, I don’t pay for taking a shower, I get paid for work – and I also have the privilege to receive some money and use it for smoking,†she said.