British
Medical
Journal,
Lancet,
Calls
on
US
to
Act
on
Needle
Exchange
1/15/98
Adding their voice to the growing chorus of well-respected medical and scientific organizations and publications advocating syringe exchange, the renowned British medical journal Lancet called on the US government to "act now" to allow the use of federal anti-AIDS funding to be used to institute such programs. The stinging editorial, which appeared in the journal's January 10 issue, notes that over one half of new HIV infections in the US could be traced, either directly or indirectly, to the sharing of an infected syringe. "Those affected are not only the drug misusers infected by contaminated needles, but their sexual partners (most of whom have been poor, black, and Hispanic women) and the children of women infected by drug misuse or sexual contact with infected drug misusers. Injection drug misuse is now the leading primary cause of pediatric AIDS." The editorial goes on to note that "despite this epidemic, the USA remains one of the few industrialized countries that refuses to provide easy access to sterile syringes" and that "given the weight of scientific evidence supporting the efficacy of needle-exchange schemes, it is hard to attribute the reluctance to support such programs to anything other than political considerations." A study conducted by Peter Laurie and Ernest Drucker, and published last year in Lancet, estimates that between four and ten thousand new infections would have been avoided in the US if the ban had not been in effect in 1997. The Lancet's editors call that estimate "conservative." The Week Online spoke with Ernest Drucker about the continued federal ban on the use of anti-AIDS funding for Syringe Exchange programs. "Once again, the administration and the US Congress are playing God, refusing to accept the evidence of countless studies showing that needle exchange saves lives... it simply saves lives. Aside from the outright shamefulness, their unwillingness to permit others to take simple steps to protect people from this disease is vindictive. Such behavior should lead their constituents to question the message being sent here -- that some American lives aren't worth saving." "It has become quite clear that the majority of Americans are prepared to support the availability of these programs. And yet, the federal government continues not only to obstruct the implementation of these lifesaving measures but to spread blatant disinformation about them. The people in Washington who are responsible for this should be called to account for the lives they've cost. And I believe that some day they will." You can send letters to the Lancet via e-mail at [email protected].
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