Few local outreach endeavors have been as controversial as the efforts to exchange clean needles for used ones with intravenous drug users.
The community debate continues, even as overdose deaths in California and the U.S. multiply during the COVID-19 pandemic and the continuing opioid crisis. Santa Cruz County continues to see a surge of drug overdose deaths this year — although health officials says the rate is significantly less here than the state.
The Harm Reduction Coalition of Santa Cruz County is a volunteer-based needle exchange nonprofit working to prevent needless deaths among the addicted. Coalition founder and Aptos resident Denise Elerick recently spoke with the Sentinel Editorial Board about the group’s emphasis on providing clean syringes to drug users, among other needed health services.
While most health officials praise the Coalition’s work, critics say the program enables harmful drug abuse and litters the county with discarded syringes and needles that many county residents have encountered in public places including popular hiking trails and parks. Elerick, a passionate advocate for the program, states the HRC is committed to sending volunteers out in the community looking for and removing used syringes.
The HRC, which received a state health grant of $405,000 to help pay for overhead costs, got another major boost in August, when the state Department of Public Health certified the group as an authorized syringe services program.
But a lawsuit filed earlier this month by a group of Santa Cruz residents including former Santa Cruz Police Chief Kevin Vogel and Santa Cruz City Council member Renee Golder, alleges the HRC provides a threat to public health because it operates in conflict with the Santa Cruz County Syringe Services Program by allowing untrained volunteers to perform services not regulated by the state. The lawsuit says the HRC did not comply with state-required environmental reviews before it started distributing, collecting and disposing of used needles.
The county SSP has a “one-for-one” syringe exchange policy, which allows for distribution of new syringes in exchange for an equivalent amount of used syringes. The program allows a maximum distribution of 100 syringes per participant, per encounter. This policy extends to secondary exchange, allowing participants to exchange syringes for others, with a cap of no more than 300 per client, per visit.
The state certification allowed the Coalition to offer its services directly to the public, rather than act as a secondary exchange through the county SSP — and provided access to a syringe-supply clearinghouse used by 56 syringe services programs in the state. The Coalition also has been distributing the opiate overdose antidote naloxone to opioid users in the county.
Another criticism of the HRC is that Santa Cruz County has an existing Syringe Services Program at the Santa Cruz Emeline Avenue health offices. But the politics surrounding drug abuse and needle exchange make more effective county distribution and collection efforts unlikely. Elerick also notes that many addicts don’t feel OK about showing up at government-based services. The county SSP also has limited hours and the HRC provides a much-needed mobile service, set up on Sundays at Coral Street between Limekiln and River streets. The program also offers home delivery by appointment on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.
In November 2019, Santa Cruz County’s Health Service Agency generated a comprehensive report on needle exchange services in the county that included a survey of users (a majority of whom are homeless living in Santa Cruz) and disposal methods and problems. The county also provides monthly reports on how many syringes are distributed and collected — although the numbers of 25,000 syringes given out monthly and 32,000 collected don’t pass the eye test of neighborhood groups who continue to find too many used and discarded syringes.
We’d like to see the Harm Reduction Coalition provide more documentation and data about all its efforts – and begin to emphasize treatment alternatives in outreach. Making these changes, along with clearer oversight by the county, would go a long way to tempering the opposition to its programs, which, make no mistake, are providing vital health services and saving lives.
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December 20, 2020 at 08:01PM
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Editorial | Volunteer-based needle exchange program providing vital services and saving lives, but needs better oversight - Santa Cruz Sentinel
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