The Needle Exchange Program

Needle Exchange Facts: Background and History

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)estimates that close to one million individuals are currently living with HIV in the United States. As of June
2000, CDC reported that there have been 753,907 reported actual AIDS cases in the U.S. Twenty-five percent of these cases are attributed to risk factors related to injecting drug use. When mother-to-child HIV transmission, and transmission though sexual contact with an injection drug user are included, 36 percent of all AIDS infections can be related to injecting drug use. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration estimates that as many as 2.4 million Americans may be injecting drug users. The link between the epidemics of HIV and substance abuse and subsequent

There is overwhelming evidence that needle exchange programs (NEPs) work: they prevent the transmission of HIV and do not promote substance use. Since 1989, Congress has restricted the use of federal funds for needle exchange programs. Initially, Congress feared that the implementation of needle exchange programs would
encourage substance abuse by sending the message that injection drug use is endorsed and promoted through the distribution of clean needles. The same thinking prevails
today. While the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) has the legal authority to determine whether needle exchange programs reduce the transmission of HIV and do not encourage the use of illegal drugs, competing political and philosophical interests have overruled those determinations. As recently as 1998, then Secretary of HHS Donna Shalala certified that based on extensive scientific research, needle exchange programs are an effective component of a comprehensive strategy to reduce HIV transmission and do not encourage the use of illegal drugs."

Giving a drug user a needle creates an obvious controversy. These programs have been an interest of mine for a while and i was interested in what everyone else thought....Do you think needle exchange programs should be illegal? There is obviously a moral reason they should not legal, and a positivist would state that drugs are clearly illegal...so why are they so accepted? I think they are efficient programs and i support. What do you think?