San Francisco Chronicle
Copyright 1995 Chronicle Publishing Co.

 

March 8, 1995, page A3

CDC Endorses Needle Swaps 

Sabin Russell 
Chronicle Staff Writer


Top federal health officials have concluded that needle exchange programs can curb the spread of AIDS and should be supported with public funds, but the Clinton administration continues to insist that the evidence is not strong enough. 

In a draft report leaked yesterday in Washington, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention called for repeal of state laws impeding needle exchange and urged linking federal support for such programs to AIDS counseling and drug treatment efforts.

The CDC report, which echoes findings by the University of California at San Francisco, was written more than a year ago, but the Clinton administration has refused to release it. 

Copies of the 48-page report were circulated yesterday by the Drug Policy Foundation, a Washington group that lobbies for federal drug policy reform. 

''Every day of inaction on needle exchange at the federal level costs lives,'' said foundation spokesman Dave Fratello. 

In needle exchange programs, intravenous drug users swap used syringes for new ones supplied by private or government agencies. Proponents say that such programs discourage the sharing of needles, one of the primary routes of transmission of the AIDS virus. 

Although California is one of many states barring needle exchange programs, the city of San Francisco openly supports Prevention Point, a once-clandestine organization that provides free syringes to drug users. There are 76 other needle exchange programs across the nation, some defying the law and some tacitly accepted. 

In 1988, Congress barred the use of federal funds for needle exchange programs unless they could be proved to both reduce the spread of AIDS and cause no increase in drug abuse. 

The CDC researchers said ''the preponderance of evidence indicates that needle exchange programs diminish HIV transmission without increasing drug use.'' 

Yet Public Health Service Director Philip Lee, whose agency sets administration AIDS prevention policy, calls the evidence inconclusive, a spokesman said. 

''Congress is clear that no recommendation for needle exchange programs can go forward,'' said Public Health Service spokesman Marty Davis. 

The CDC affirmed a UCSF review, which recommended in October 1993 that ''substantial federal funds'' be spent to expand such programs. 

Dr. Peter Lurie, author of the UCSF study, said the Clinton administration squelched the recommendations in fear of a Republican-dominated Congress: 

''I cannot think of another example where the federal government denied people at great risk of HIV a potentially life-saving intervention. This outstrips all previous government misconduct on this issue. This has nothing to do with science. It's politics, pure and simple.'' 

The CDC said dirty needle use by drug takers is linked to a third of U.S. AIDS cases, including half of those among African Americans and Latinos. 

In addition to urging federal funds for needle exchange programs, especially those that direct clients toward HIV counseling and drug treatment, the report called for more spending on research on needle exchanges, decriminalization of hypodermic syringe possession and policies to make needles readily available at pharmacies without a prescription.