Clean Needles, Save Lives

For more than two decades, advocates for harm reduction programs, battled with lawmakers to lift the ban on funding for needle exchange programs. On July 24, 2009, the U. S. House of Representatives passed a $730.5 billion bill (HR 3293) to fund health, education, and labor programs in fiscal 2010. The lawmakers that were against lifting the ban, filed an amendment that sought to keep the ban in place; however, they did not prevail when the amendment was rejected by a vote of 211-218.

 In the late 1980’s at the very height of the AIDS epidemic, lawmakers voted to withhold funding for needle exchange programs. However, this did not hold back harm reduction advocates, and research programs, that were determined to provide these services. For many years,  programs that founded the needle exchange,  have been supplying clean needles to addicts, and getting addicts into drug treatment; as a result, they  have shown , that the rate of intravenous drug use related infections has decreased. Despite studies that show clean needles slow down the rate of intravenous drug use related infections, ideologues in Congress continued to believe that supplying clean needles to addicts promote drug use.

 During the time of Clinton’s administration, there was mixed support for needle exchange programs, and lifting the ban on the funding looked promising, but once again, the lawmakers against funding the needle exchange program triumphed, and kept the ban in place. The possibilities of lifting the ban appeared grim for the following decade .With his election into presidency, Obama, and his administration have brought forth many positive changes in our country. When President Obama signed the appropriations bill, that lifted the ban on funding needle exchange programs, it sent a clear message, that he is serious about his administration's new approach to drug addiction. For many harm reduction advocates, the end to this lengthy struggle is a historic achievement. However, the repeal on the 21-year-old ban on federal funding for needle exchange programs comes in too late for many Americans who have lost loved ones to AIDS, AIDS related diseases, and it is much too late for the Americans who have lost their lives.