CLEAN NEEDLES REDUCE THE HEALTH RISK

The evidence keeps mounting that our measly efforts to stop the spread of
infectious diseases in prison are failing.

Yet even the latest news of the alarming prevalence of hepatitis C and HIV
in the Edmonton Institution for Women is unlikely to spur the powers that
be to make the tough political decisions necessary for appropriate health
policy.

At first glance, it might seem odd that so many more women in prison are
infected than men. In a report released Wednesday, Corrections Canada
revealed that 75% of the inmates at Edmonton's women's prison have
hepatitis C and 13% of them have HIV.

The hep-C rate among male prisoners on the Prairies, however, is only 20%
and their HIV rate is a much smaller 1.7%.

Do women use drugs so much more than men? Not at all, says Ralf Jurgens of
the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network.

It's just that a much higher proportion of women are in prison because of
drug-related offences. Men tend to be incarcerated for a much broader range
of crimes.

But infectious diseases don't discriminate. Man or woman, those bugs don't
care. Give them an easy mode of transmission, like dirty needles or unsafe
sex, and they're off to the races.

So although the infectious disease epidemic at the women's prison is
shocking, this is not a women's issue. Neither is it just an
across-the-board prison problem.

Hepatitis C and HIV don't stay behind in the jail cells when inmates are
released. A prisoner who becomes infected in jail might end up being the
same guy or gal who passes it on to someone you know out in the real world.

For years, drug addiction experts have been badgering the government to
lift its head out of the sand and treat drug-addicted prisoners as patients
- - not criminals.

But Corrections Canada has refused to budge, aside from providing bleach
kits to injection drug users.

Officials continue to balk at providing comprehensive methadone treatment
or needle exchange programs. They prefer to rely on urine testing instead.

The results are what you might expect. In its report this week, Corrections
Canada revealed there's been a dramatic increase in the number of federal
inmates with HIV. There are now 217 prisoners known to have HIV, up from
143 in 1995. In 1990, there were only 26 known HIV-positive prisoners.

How's that for a track record?

As for Edmonton's women's prison, Corrections Canada has hired a health
promotion nurse "to teach them how to work with their disease and avoid
transmitting it to anyone else," jail spokesman Audrey Hatto said Thursday.
She was cool to the idea of a needle exchange, explaining they can be used
as weapons.

Well, let's see. Prisoners have had access to clean needles in Switzerland
for years and there hasn't been a single threatening incident involving a
syringe. Not only that, there's been no increase in drug use.

Spain and Germany have had similar results with pilot projects involving
prison needle exchanges.

Last summer, in a presentation to the International AIDS Conference in
Durban, South Africa, Spain reported that providing prisoners with clean
needles reduced risky behaviour without increasing drug use.

The correctional officers noted that there was no conflict because of the
program and the prisoners never used the needles as weapons. The needle
exchange has now been expanded to five other Spanish prisons.

Germany also has a success story. Since 1996, inmates in a women's prison
have been able to get needles from dispensing machines. In the men's jails,
the syringes are handed out by drug counselling staff.

Not only have no needles been used as weapons, there has been no increase
in the incidence of HIV among the regular users of the exchange and more
drug addicts have entered treatment.

But I guess Corrections Canada knows better. They spend hundreds of
thousands of dollars a year on urine testing. And inmates continue shooting
up with dirty needles.