Ogden needle-exchange program for drug users in the works, advocates say
Heather Bush of the Utah Department of Health, in the front, addresses a gathering of Weber County health officials and others on implementation of needle-exchange programs in the state. The Jan. 31, 2017, meeting was held at Weber Human Services in Ogden.
Heather Bush of the Utah Department of Health, left, addresses a gathering of Weber County health officials and others on implementation of needle-exchange programs in the state. Mindy Vincent of the Utah Harm Reduction Coalition, which operates a program in Salt Lake City and plans to launch one in Ogden, listens. The Jan. 31, 2017, meeting was held at Weber Human Services in Ogden.
OGDEN — A needle-exchange program meant to minimize the spread of disease among drug users will be coming to Weber County, replicating a program launched last December in Salt Lake City.
“The plan has always been to provide syringe exchange throughout the state, said Mindy Vincent, executive director of the Utah Harm Reduction Coalition, which runs the Salt Lake City effort.
During a gathering in Ogden to discuss the initiative with health officials and others here, Vincent said the local effort — allowed under legislation approved by Utah lawmakers in 2016 — could be launched within 30 days, by early March. The Salt Lake City program, launched on Dec. 1, operates out of a tent and provides free needles twice a week, typically drawing 100 to 200 takers each time, according to Vincent.
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Turner Bitton, president of the boards of the Utah Harm Reduction Coalition and the Drug Policy Project of Utah, said he’s been scouting locations to hold the exchange initiative in Ogden and has pinpointed a potential spot. Needle-exchange programs are meant to curtail spread of Hepatitis C and the HIV virus by fostering use of clean syringes, and Vincent estimates that 90 percent of the participants in the Salt Lake City program are intravenous heroin users.
“It tells you how much of a problem (heroin use) really is,” she said. Vincent, herself a recovered meth addict, suspects use of heroin is an issue in Ogden and that there would be demand for a needle-exchange program, based on her experience.
Though the 2016 legislation, House Bill 308, allows for creation of syringe-exchange programs, it doesn’t provide funding. The Ogden effort would be funded by private donations, money provided by Vincent and other resources. Vincent said the Utah Department of Health — which had a rep at the meeting on Tuesday, Heather Bush — would supply the syringes.
Eric Young, the deputy chief of the Ogden Police Department and a participant in the gathering here, expressed some reservations with needle-exchange programs. They can lead to more needles in circulation in the city, result in more needles not being properly disposed of and create a potential health hazard. Moreover, the programs can create negative public perceptions.
Even so, Young said police reps would continue taking part in the discussions about launching the program here.
’Need to be loved'
Bush, the viral hepatitis and syringe exchange coordinator at the Utah Department of Health, told those at the Ogden gathering that if needle-exchange efforts are to take shape in Utah, it will take grassroots efforts, particularly with no funding from the state.
“It’s really you. You guys make it happen,” she said, calling needle-exchange initiatives a “small piece” in broader efforts to fight drug abuse. The meeting was held at Weber Human Services building.
The Ogden program would be the second in Utah after Salt Lake City’s. Vincent provides needles in Wasatch and Utah counties, but only to clients when they request them, not at a fixed time and place, as is the plan in Ogden.
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Grant funds are available from private groups, according to Bitton, and he said he may approach Utah lawmakers in 2018 about providing funding for needle-exchange efforts. First, though, he and other advocates want to get a gauge of the preliminary efforts, like the Salt Lake City program and the planned Ogden initiative.
Whatever the case, such programs can be controversial. Though some critics contend needle-exchange initiatives encourage drug use, Bush said studies show that is not the case and that they have the desired impact of slowing the spread of disease.
She also said they can also serve as a means to reach out to drug users to get them on the road to recovery. Per rules of H.B. 308, those running needle-exchange programs are required to distribute referral information to drug- and alcohol-treatment programs, among other things. “It’s a point of contact with people who may not otherwise walk in our doors,” Bush said.
Beyond that, Vincent sees needle-exchange efforts as a means of expressing compassion toward drug users. Some make distinctions between “worthy” and “unworthy” beneficiaries of public assistance, Vincent said, but she doesn’t see it that way.
Drug abusers “still need to be loved. They still need to be taken care of.”
Contact reporter Tim Vandenack at tvandenack@standard.net, follow him on Twitter at @timvandenack or like him on Facebook at Facebook.com/timvandenackreporter.