by Autumn Moore

Created on: October 13, 2011

Sirens wail on the next street, guns pop and jerk from another deal gone wrong, children cry out for attention but receive none, eyes are blurry and red, and consciousness is thick and murky. They live for highs, and nothing else matters, because they are addicted. Drugs and the use of drugs affect, in various degrees, everyone in the world today. For America, one in every seven has tried an illegal drug. Whether or not the use of drugs is a right is an argument that has cost lives and has led many to be seeking after a solution. One such solution is the needle and syringe exchange program. The needle and syringe program is an ineffective method of harm reduction because it legalizes a form of drugs when drug use is not a right, it allows for the easier access of drugs, and it increases the rate of those dependent on drugs.

The needle and syringe program was invented to “reduce the damage associated with unsterile or contaminated injecting equipment (Wikipedia).” It was designed to help people with AIDS or Hepatitis C to have clean needles for injections. But because people can get needles with little or no cost (depending on which system of the exchange program is in that country), drug addicts can exchange their dirty heroin needles for clean, new heroin needles.

"A 2010 review of reviews led by Norah Palmateer, which examined systematic reviews and meta-analyses on the topic, concluded that there is insufficient evidence that NSP (needle and syringe program) prevents the transmission of Hepatitis C virus, tentative evidence that it prevents the transmission of HIV and sufficient evidence that it reduces self-reported injection risk behavior (Wikipedia).”

And so this program that sought to help people is only making another way for people to harm themselves via addictions to drugs that will not help them in the long run. And governments fund this program, so in a way, they allow for the funding of drug consumption. Countries that have a program like the needle and syringe program are Australia, Brazil, Canada, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Ireland, Iran, and the United States, although the United States government does not fund this program.

The use of drugs is not a right; some argue that if drugs were legalized, then the crime surrounding drugs would decrease significantly, as well as the overall consumption of drugs would decrease. This argument holds a correlation to the Prohibition

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