WHY DOES THE HAIGHT NEEDLE EXCHANGE GIVE NEEDLES TO PEOPLE WHO DONT BRING IN DIRTY NEEDLES?
The drug user who has no needle at all is the drug user at highest risk of using another person’s dirty needle. The Haight needle exchange, like every exchange in San Francisco, will give a limited number of clean needles to drug users who do not have any. A recent study of 26 needle exchanges in California showed that counties with a strict one-for-one policy (i.e. no needle could be given out unless a dirty one was brought in) had just as many needles found on the streets as counties such as San Francisco which allowed exchanges to give limited numbers of needles to people who had none. However, the study found drug users in counties with a strict one-for-one policy had higher rates of needle sharing than those without3. Additionally, in 1997 the town of Windham in Connecticut closed its only needle exchange following community concerns that the needle exchange was the primary source of street-discarded needles. A Federally funded study conducted in the county during this period foun
