PLAYING AIDS GAMES IN NEW JERSEY

The New Jersey State Senate is placing politics above public safety -
and tacitly promoting the spread of H.I.V. and AIDS - by failing to
pass a desperately needed needle exchange bill that was approved by
the State Assembly last year. Without access to clean needles, or to
treatment programs, which are now overcrowded, addicts risk almost
certain infection by continuing to share needles with other addicts.
They then spread AIDS through sexual contact to their wives, lovers
and unborn children, endangering an ever-widening circle of lives.

Opponents of needle exchange programs typically argue that furnishing
addicts with clean needles "legitimizes" drug use. But this view is
based in ideology, not science. It has been directly contradicted by
studies carried out across the United States and around the world
that show that needle exchanges slow the spread of disease without
creating new intravenous-drug addicts. The needle exchange solution
is sorely needed in New Jersey, which has one of the highest
infection rates in the country, and especially in Atlantic City, an
epicenter of the state's AIDS epidemic.

Before he left office last year, Gov. James McGreevey issued an
executive order allowing needle exchange programs, hoping that the
State Legislature would act later. The Senate, however, has dragged
its feet. In addition, a group of senators, led by Tom Kean Jr., a
Republican, have challenged the executive order in court. Mr. Kean
may benefit politically from this move. But New Jerseyans as a whole
will pay a price in spreading infections, higher costs to care for
AIDS patients and more unnecessarily lost lives.