Pubdate: Sun, 20 Aug 2000 Source: Ottawa Sun (CN ON) Copyright: 2000, Canoe Limited Partnership. Contact: http://www.canoe.ca/OttawaSun/ Forum: http://www.canoe.ca/Chat/home.html Author: Steve Madely, The date above is what appears on the newspaper website. We are not sure if the column has been posted to the website pending publication on that date, or if the date is in error. NEEDLE EXCHANGE DOES MORE HARM THAN GOOD There is no more perfect example of permissiveness rum amok, than the needle and condom distribution programs aimed at preventing the spread of AIDS. An excellent expose in the current edition of CFRA Colleague Lowell Green's Canada First newsletter spells out the scandalous results of government funded needle exchange programs (NEP's) in Ottawa, Vancouver and Montreal. The common denominator in study after study of HIV infection rates, is that contrary to the intent, the programs are at best showing no beneficial results, and at the worst may actually be helping to spread the disease and increase drug abuse. No specific statistics are available to compare HIV infection rates amongst Ottawa-Carleton's intravenous drug addict population before and after the local needle exchange program was introduced in 1991. But, we do know this much: The HIV infection rate for needle exchange users in this city is currently 20%, almost as high as Vancouver's. By extrapolation, it's a safe assumption that infection rates here have increased, just as they have in other major cities where NEPs are in effect. The Vancouver program has kept careful records on HIV rates and the numbers are startling! With the largest needle exchange program in the world the B.C. city, which is Canada's acknowledged heroin drug capital, has seen a tenfold increase in infection rates amongst NEP users. When the program began in 1988, HIV prevalence for Vancouver's intravenous drug users was 2%. Today, despite a program which distributes a mind numbing 2.8 million free IV needles per year to the city's notorious addict population, the HIV rate amongst NEP users surpasses 23%! Why are rates increasing? Perhaps because the theory that drug addicts would abandon the sharing of contaminated needles when supplied with free fresh needles is dead wrong! The theory has been shattered by reality. A reality advocates of the programs are unwilling to accept. An exhaustive Montreal study, published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, found that 75% of needle exchange program clients continue to share needles, roughly the same percentage as non-clients. What's worse is the McGill University finding that 33% of NEP clients became infected during the study period compared to 13% of non-clients. "In other words," the newsletter reports "addicts who used the Montreal needle exchange were more than twice as likely to become infected with HIV as those who did not take part in the program." Programs intended to reduce the rate of HIV and AIDS infection are clearly not working and the more frightening likelihood, based on the figures, is that they may be having the exactly opposite effect. Should anyone be surprised at the results of this permissiveness? Despite consistent predictions from most sex educators and public health authorities that free distribution of condoms in Canadian high schools would reduce the incidence of unprotected sex, every reliable study of teenaged sexual practices shows otherwise. They have been proven wrong, yet we continue to rely on their programs and "expertise." Kids are starting to have sex at a younger age. More teens are admitting to unprotected sexual practices than ever before. Yet we seem resigned to the notion -- locked in the mindset -- that the solution lies in handing out even more free condoms, preferably in kinky colours and flavours. In the prison system, where quite incredibly officialdom now hands out needles, bleach and condoms rather than enforcing regulations and laws, diseases spread by needle sharing and unsafe sexual practices are rampant. The officials who advocated these programs have a record of failure to show for their efforts, yet we are allowing them to implement even more of the same. Meanwhile, in the dark world of drug addiction the misguided experts who gave us needle exchange programs now rule unchallenged. Their solution -- the path of least resistance -- falls right in line with a new social mentality that says, on moral issues, we'd rather surrender than fight. Instead of forcing addicts into treatment programs, we have sold out to the insane notion that ready availability of free clean needles will somehow turn addicts into health fanatics. Zapped, but healthy. What lunacy! - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake