Some local governments believe that heroin addicts who say they can't or won't succeed in treatment programs should be given clean needles - at government expense - so they won't get diseases such as hepatitis or AIDS from sharing dirty needles. This is an example of the public health tenet of "harm reduction," which has enjoyed great support in places such as Vancouver, B.C.
Seattle-King County Public Health runs a needle exchange downtown, and in six other locations, comfortably sustaining addicts in their habit at taxpayer expense. It's hard to say whether a needle exchange in a downtown or a city neighborhood is worse. The Tacoma News Tribune has published a lengthy and illuminating report on a mobile needle exchange serving the city's Hilltop neighborhood. Badly-needed urban pioneer Hilltop couples with kids, and other, lower-income families with kids are having a hard time with the behavior of the needle van's clients. So hard that you have to wonder if "harm reduction" isn't really "harm infliction," both for the needle-using "clients" and those blessed with the community "externalities."
Here is a radical concept. Maybe, just maybe, it shouldn't be government's job to do anything for drug addicts. Drug addiction is a choice, unlike, say, a dangerous outbreak of a contagious disease, which would properly be the business of a government health agency. Let those communities of faith and private foundations that wish to, work with drug addicts, and dispense a more demanding and merciful medicine than the slow death delivery system embodied by government needle exchanges.
Posted by Matt Rosenberg at May 01, 2006 01:35 PM | Email ThisI think it more likely that I would give money to the communities of faith, et al, if the Feds and State didn't take so much of my money and put in these programs.
I would never fester ill will to the downtrodden. I am lucky I am not there yet. But, I don't give money to the faith communities because of the taxes I already spend for this activity.
So, since Matt's good idea will never happen, I say give out the needles, but I support Matt.
Posted by: swatter on May 1, 2006 01:59 PMIf there is one thing that is an absolute in Tacoma/Pierce County it is that what is in the interest of the ‘elites’ gets done.
As I have pointed out – these projects are little more that a scheme by which a certain cabal within the local councils (both City and County) have devised a way to enrich themselves, family members and close business associates.
Should these Needle Exchanges be seen as having a negative financial impact on them they will be gone so fast it will make your head spin.
The state of Washington and King County continue to put the government into positions for supporting illegal and unhealthy behavior.
One has to question a government that bans smoking within 25' of a doorway but then supports the poors' dangerous drug habits.
Posted by: Michael on May 1, 2006 02:37 PMIf a group of five people want to shoot up together but have two syringes, do you think they'll have two shoot up, go exchange the syringes, then two more, then exchange, then the last one?
One-for-one needle exchanges are probably harmless, but really don't accomplish much.
Making syringes easy enough to get that they could be regarded as one-time-use items might have some effect at reducing AIDS communication among drug users, but unless the used needles are properly disposed of they could endanger other people who might step on them or otherwise get pricked.
If people who share syringes had the discipline to rinse them out with bleach or rubbing alcohol that would probably reduce contagion; certainly bleach and rubbing alcohol aren't hard to get. I've certainly seen brochures suggesting such cleaning. If drug addicts aren't willing to even do that, what reason is there to expect a needle-exchange to stem their self-destructive ways.
Posted by: supercat on May 1, 2006 04:44 PMWhat cost me more? Supporting the cost of a few needles or a of hepatitus, AIDS and other diseases?
The answer is simple to me. Buy the damn needles!
Forget about the cost of housing the addicts in prisons - we already know that doesn't work! And the end of that road is more laws, more cops, and less freedom.
Posted by: Deadwood on May 1, 2006 05:38 PMA quick google on "needle exchange" brought me to sites looking at the effects on deaths, health care costs, and drug use. One apparently reputable study showed $20 saved for each $1 spent, with no increase in drug use. And don't you think the life of even an addict is worth something?
Don't trust me; I'm no expert. Do your own research. But only on the WASL (and apparently SoundPolitics) are you allowed to support your case with invented "facts".
Posted by: Bruce on May 1, 2006 10:51 PMSeems to be just a tiny bit hypocritical. Shock, Faint!!!!!!
You are so right...last week Tacoma’s Mayor “Billy Bumble” led a march on infamous Tacoma Ave., to send the message to the entire alliteratively self-employed street venders (pimps, ho’s, unlicensed pharmacist) to get off the Hilltop and go back to Spanaway or some other unincorporated part of Pierce County.
Therefore, what do the powers to be do for the merchants on Tacoma Ave...they turn off the streetlights. “IF YOU CANT SEE THEM THEY AREN’T THEIR”
Welcome to Billy Bumble’s World and Laddenburgville!!!
You can supply them with new, sterile needles every single time they use, but if they do not use a meticulous asceptic technique in handling their needle and injecting their drug, the needle won't be sterile for more than about three seconds.
Brochures advising drug users to "sterilize" their own needles by cleaning them with bleach or alcohol, or boiling them, are ridiculous. It amazes me that the "professionals" who write those things don't know any better than that. If sterilizing something was that easy, hospitals and laboratories would not spend $thousands on autoclaves and other equipment, and sophisticated techniques to sterilize instruments. Bleach, alcohol and boiling can make things less dirty, but they come nowhere near sterilizing them. If there was staph or hepatitis on it before it was boiled or bleached, there will be staph or hepatitis on it after - but maybe a little less.
Even if a drug addict did use a sterile needle every single time, and a good sterile technique to keep from contaminating it as soon as he opened the package, it still would not prevent him from getting infections, because the drugs themselves are dirty. These drugs are not manufactured in $50 million dollar sterile laboratories using meticulous procedures, and subject to FDA regulations and inspections, and lawsuits by infected customers. They are cooked up in some garage or outbuilding, or someone's kitchen or basement, or in a wharehouse or barn on some farm in South America or Afghanistan, by some scraggly character with greasy hair and dirty hands, and staph, hepatitis or HIV oozing from infected scabs.
Someone who starts shooting up heroin today has nearly a 100 per cent chance of having hepatitis C within a year, with or without a needle exchange program.
However, the law will do more damage to the lives of these people than their drugs will do.
I am thinking we’s should be given de druggies free drugs also, dat ways they will have more money to bets wid and buy more lottery tickets.
Forgetaboutit
A quick google on "needle exchange" brought me to sites looking at the effects on deaths, health care costs, and drug use. One apparently reputable study showed $20 saved for each $1 spent, with no increase in drug use.
This is a projected statistic that makes an educated guess as to 1)dollars saved due to lower healthcare expenditures for IV drug related illnesses, 2)the increase in drug use, 3)the needle exchange programs are responsible for the lack of increase in drug use.
Lots of holes in these stats Bruce.
Posted by: Jeffro on May 2, 2006 10:20 AMI'm all for saving lives, even protecting lives, we're actually willing to provide needles for IV drug use in order to save lives, but the same folks who advocate this program are for assisted suicide and abortion, this indicates to me that they feel some lives have more value, in this case the life of a drug addict has more value than a terminally ill or unborn person.
Talk about values.
Posted by: Dan on May 2, 2006 10:39 AMHow many people have you known who died of drug overdose?...or from years of drug and/or alcohol abuse? I have seen many and it's a grievous thing to watch. Idiot liberals like yourself think it's compassionate to use government funds to assist drug users in killing themselves. You and your ilk are a disgrace to the human race.
Posted by: Saltherring on May 2, 2006 11:32 AMThe point is obvious, Bruce: If you give a guy the rope to hang himself with, you're still guilty of contributing to his suicide when you knew exactly what he was going to do with it! Do I really need to explain it further?? YOU ARE AN ACCOMPLICE IN HELPING THESE PEOPLE DAMAGE THEMSELVES! Period! Any day could be their last injection because their body finally quit--AND YOU WANT TO FEEL GOOD THAT YOU GAVE THEM THAT LAST NEEDLE? Wouldn't you rather say that you DIDN'T give them that last needle? That would be the better thing to have said. Or that even if they stopped heroin but sustained lifelong organ damage, you would be proud that you helped them inject poison into their bodies??
This is truly evil coming in the name of good. You DON'T help them poison themselves. Period. It is a twisted form of cruelty coming in the deceitful cloak of 'caring'. The more caring thing to do would be to lock them up and never let them near heroin again.
54% of statistics are invented on the fly. I googled 37 apparently reputable studies that refuted yours. Do your own research.
Whatever you do, stand on your head and insist that the whole world is upside down. Do not heed Michele's words as they make entirely too much sense! Red is white and blue is black.
There, doesn't that feeeeeel better?!
Posted by: alphabet soup on May 3, 2006 11:47 AM