Gov/en/Portal:R&D/Open-Calls:Addiction-Transition-Bus

💡 In simple words: Some people are very sick from taking many dangerous drugs at once. One idea under study is a bus that moves daily and helps them take only one substance instead of many. This page invites researchers to propose fair agreements.

🎯 In 20 seconds (scientific summary): Draft use-case open call (Wave 2, not launched). Topic: the contractual layer of a harm-reduction scenario where a mobile bus would dispense a controlled substance free, conditional on regular testing showing a transition to single-substance dependence. The call would collect contract templates, milestones and studies. Real implementation would require legal authorisation and medical supervision.

Open Call Status
Wave	Second Wave (Draft)
Status	Not launched yet
Members / Commission	Undetermined (Under construction)
Chairperson	TBD
Facilitator	TBD

Use Case: The Transition Bus, from Polysubstance to Single-Substance Dependence (draft Open Call)

Use case study, WikiDeal R&D. Status: draft Open Call, Wave 2, not yet launched, not decided, not yet implemented.

Origin	🟢 WikiDeal concept (see credits)
Status	Draft Open Call, Wave 2, not yet launched, not decided, not yet implemented
Type	Call for studies and contractual proposals (use case mode)
Rewards	To be defined at launch

The use case: a bus that moves every day

The scenario studied here starts from a public health observation: polysubstance use, the combined consumption of several drugs, is far more destructive than a stabilised dependence on a single substance. People who reduce from many substances to one often regain sleep, routine, social ties and a real capacity to work, even while remaining dependent.

The idea under study is a bus:

• The bus would move to a different location every day, across the neighbourhoods of a city or between cities, instead of fixing the problem in one place.
• It would dispense a controlled substance free of charge to registered participants with polysubstance dependence.
• The free supply would be conditional: participants accept regular testing demonstrating that they have effectively moved from polysubstance use to a single substance.
• The goal is not abstinence at any cost. It is a measured, verifiable reduction of harm: participants remain dependent, but on one known substance, at a level compatible with balance, health follow-up and fitness for work.

This is not a decided WikiDeal programme. It is a use case: a realistic scenario used to explore what fair, clear, auditable agreements between a care structure and its participants could look like.

Precedents this scenario builds on

The scenario does not come from nowhere. It extends several documented harm reduction practices:

• Heroin-assisted treatment, pioneered in Switzerland since 1994, where diacetylmorphine is prescribed and dispensed under medical supervision (see the four pillars drug policy of Switzerland).
• Opioid agonist therapy and methadone maintenance, which stabilise dependence on one known, dosed substance.
• Supervised injection sites, needle exchange programmes and drug checking services, which accept the reality of consumption and reduce its damage.
• Contingency management, a clinically studied approach where verified behaviour change (through testing) is rewarded by concrete incentives.

What the scenario adds to these precedents is the combination of mobility (the bus changes location each day, going to the people rather than making them come) and an explicit contract (free supply against verified transition to single-substance use).

What this open call would collect

WikiDeal aims at building contract models, not health services. This call, when launched, would therefore collect the contractual layer of the scenario: every document and mechanism needed so that the deal between the bus operator and each participant is clear, fair, humane and verifiable. Expected types of proposals include:

• Application modalities: how a person joins the programme, eligibility, registration, informed consent, data protection.
• Contract templates: the core agreement between the operating structure and the participant (free supply, testing schedule, mutual commitments, exit conditions).
• Amendments: modification clauses for evolving situations (dosage adjustments, relapse episodes, change of city, transfer to another care structure).
• Alert mechanisms: graduated alert clauses when tests reveal a return to polysubstance use, designed as care signals rather than punishments.
• Milestone plans: step-by-step trajectories (entry, stabilisation, verified single-substance status, optional further reduction), each step with its rights and duties.
• Tutorials: plain-language guides for participants, families, street workers and bus staff, explaining the agreements in simple words.
• Studies: scientific, legal and ethical analyses of the scenario, its benefits, its risks and its conditions of acceptability.

In every proposal, the moving bus stays the anchor: all clauses, alerts, steps and tutorials must remain workable in a mobile setting that changes location each day, with participants who may meet the bus in different places over time.

Strict framing

• Nothing on this page is medical or legal advice, and nothing is a decision.
• Any real-world implementation of such a programme would require legal authorisation under national drug law and medical supervision by qualified professionals. The contractual models called for here are tools offered to such authorised actors, nothing more.
• Participant data (identity, test results, dosages) belongs to the category of private data: in the WikiDeal approach it would stay under the control of the participant and the care structure, never published. Only anonymised, aggregated statistics and the contract templates themselves are intended for publication.
• This call is intended for Wave 2 of the Open Calls. It is a draft: launch date, deadline, rewards and evaluation modalities would be announced at launch, following the rules summarised on the main Open Call page and detailed in the Open Call FAQ.

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See also: Open Calls · Open Call FAQ · All innovations · R&D Portal