needle exchange
Battling prison disease
By Judith Lavoie, Times Colonist
Drugs find their way into prisons, despite all efforts to plug supply lines. And for many inmates, the most dangerous part of life inside is sharing jury-rigged needles.
Lack of knowledge, misery and addictions combine in a sometimes lethal mix, but Canadian prisons do not permit distribution of clean needles -- meaning health risks soar for an already at-risk population.
Harm-reduction advocates say need-exchange efforts have lost ground
A tearful Bernie Pauly acknowledged Victoria’s street community, including some who have died, as she described Victoria’s stalled harm-reduction efforts to a packed community forum Wednesday night.
Pauly, an assistant nursing professor and a research fellow at the University of Victoria’s Centre for Addictions Research, said Victoria’s harm-reduction plan had vision but has lost ground — and its fixed needle exchange.
“In 2002, I thought we were poised for change,” said Pauly. “In 2004, we had the four pillars of harm reduction — prevention, treatment, housing and enforcement.”
Failure to aid drug users drives HIV spread: study
By Kate Kelland, Reuters
LONDON (Reuters) - More than 90 percent of the world's 16 million injecting drug users are offered no help to avoid contracting AIDS, and governments that ignore them risk a spiraling public health crisis, drugs experts said on Monday.
A "critical health problem" is growing in places like Russia, China, Malaysia and Thailand, they said, where drug users are a neglected population in the fight against AIDS and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes it.
Give Inmates Clean Needles
Constructive pragmatism will do much more for inmate health than knee jerk conservatism.
Neil Boyd, The Mark
A recent report from the Canadian HIV/AIDS network has called for the implementation of needle exchange programs in Canadian prisons. The report notes that rates of HIV and Hepatitis C infection are about 20 times higher in our jails than in the general population. Further, jail appears to be a breeding ground for illegal drug use, especially for intravenous drugs.
This isn’t news – we’ve known this to be true of federal institutions in Canada for more than a generation. And this report provides ample testimony from former inmates regarding the drug use that they and other prisoners engaged in. With a sporadic supply of needles, sharing equipment becomes commonplace.
The lack of needles and the damage done
If needle exchange works in Canadian cities big and small, then why do we refuse to implement the practice in our prisons?Andre Picard, Globe and Mail
Providing clean needles to intravenous drug users is a broadly accepted and successful public health measure: When you reduce needle-sharing, you prevent transmission of blood-borne illnesses like hepatitis C and HIV-AIDS.
Historic trauma in aboriginals boosts hepatitis C risk
The trauma of having a parent who was forced to attend a residential school is linked to higher rates of hepatitis C infection among aboriginal young people in B.C., new research suggests.
The research was part of the Cedar Project, a long-term collaborative research project focusing on HIV and hepatitis C infection in young aboriginal drug users in British Columbia.
The project aims to understand the relationship between historical trauma — such as having a parent or grandparent who attended a residential school — and vulnerability to blood-borne diseases.
Researchers had already linked a history of sexual abuse among the young group under study with having a parent who attended a residential school or was involved in the child welfare system.
Sites lauded as lifesavers
Drugs: Medical ethicist says safe injection locations 'brilliant' at preventing overdose deathsAPRIL ROBINSON, TELEGRAPH-JOURNAL
SAINT JOHN - There would be no downside to setting up a safe injection site in Saint John, says a medical ethicist and board member of AIDS Saint John.
"People might debate whether Saint John needs one or not, but I would say there's no harm in having one," said Tim Christie, associate professor in bioethics at Dalhousie University and a lecturer at the University of New Brunswick Saint John.
"They're brilliant at preventing people from dying of overdose deaths. They're brilliant at linking people with other treatments."
In 2009, 18 substance abusers in Saint John died while on a waiting list for treatment, Christie said.
DRUG ABUSE IN PRISONS
Editorial, The Chronicle Herald (ChronicleHerald.ca)PRISONS are closed environments. But they are no more circumscribed than the debate about how to run them.
Judging by the tenor of remarks posted on our online news site, the general public went into attitudinal lockdown immediately after a report, released last week, recommended needle-exchange programs for convicts who are drug addicts.
The Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network makes a compelling case, backed up by 50 testimonials from ex-prisoners, for giving "harm reduction" policies a try in prisons. But the plea for reform contained in Under the Skin is falling on the deaf ears of the electorate and of elected officials.
Push on for prison syringe program
By EVA HOARE, The Chronicle HeraldWhen Raylene Elizabeth Nicole started doing time for assault at Springhill Institution, she was surprised the prison was rife with even more drugs than the one she had been incarcerated at in Ontario.
"At Springhill, it was like its own society," Ms. Nicole, then 39, said in a sworn affidavit to a national association collecting data on drug use by Canadian prisoners.
"There were even more drugs than there was at Kingston.
"I stuck to heroin at Springhill, where I snorted and injected it.
AIDS panel reiterates call for prison needle exchange
By Carol Sanders, Winnipeg Free PressWINNIPEG — The longer Parliament is on hold, the longer prison inmates are sharing dirty needles and diseases with the community at large, former prisoners and health advocates say.
The Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network was supposed to appear Tuesday before the Commons Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security calling for a needle exchange where inmates can trade dirty needles for clean ones.
"Prorogation swept us off the table," said spokesman Gilles Marchildon. "Every day we delay in taking a better approach is a day where more prisoners are contracting HIV and hepatitis C."
