CITY TO SPEND $650,000 ON NEEDLE EXCHANGE PROGRAMS

The District will invest $650,000 in needle exchange programs to
combat the spread of HIV-AIDS in the wake of Congress's decision to
end a ban on the city's use of public money for such efforts, D.C.
officials said yesterday.

Mayor Adrian M. Fenty (D) and several D.C. Council members said the
funding was an important step in a larger effort to reduce the rate
of infection among residents. The city has one of the highest rates
in the nation: One in 20 residents is thought to have HIV, and 1 in
50 residents is believed to have AIDS, according to a study released
in November.

Needle exchange programs allow participants to trade used syringes
for new ones.

"This program goes to best practices to combat one of our greatest
health problems," Fenty said at a news conference at the headquarters
of PreventionWorks!, which operates a needle exchange program and
will receive a $300,000 city grant. The remaining $350,000 will go
toward developing additional needle exchange programs, Fenty said.

For a decade, Congress had barred the city from using public money
for such programs, which can be controversial because the syringes
are used to inject drugs such as heroin. Congress removed the ban
during its recent passage of an omnibus appropriations bill.

Ken Vail of PreventionWorks! estimated that his organization serves
about 2,000 people at 12 locations in the city and exchanged 200,000
syringes last year.

In a news release hailing the announcement, Del. Eleanor Holmes
Norton (D-D.C.) said, "The District's AIDS rate is artificially
elevated" because of the previous congressional ban. "Now we have a
lot of catching up to do."

Council member David A. Catania (I-At Large), chairman of the
Committee on Health, said the public investment will pay off in the
long run if the program is successful. "The cost of infection is
immeasurably higher in terms of dollars and lives," Catania said.

Shannon Hader, head of the District's HIV-AIDS Administration, said
she expects the city to foster new needle exchange programs that
could take several forms, including mobile clinics and outreach and
fixed-site programs.

Asked how he would respond to residents who object to such programs
in their neighborhoods, Fenty said everyone should "be concerned"
about the HIV-AIDS epidemic.

The 120-page report released in November found that HIV was spread
through heterosexual contact in more than 37 percent of the
District's cases detected during that period, compared with the 25
percent of cases attributable to men having sex with other men.