Pubdate: Sun, 11 Mar 2001
Source: Press Democrat, The (CA)
Copyright: 2001 The Press Democrat
Contact:  Letters Editor, P. O. Box 569, Santa Rosa CA 95402
Fax: (707) 521-5305
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Author: Derek J. Moore, The Press Democrat

IN NEED OF NEEDLES

Program Draws Praise, Criticism By Handing Out Clean Needles To Drug Users

Susan Seitz sips hot chocolate in a Guerneville cafe while waiting for her 
shift handing out clean needles to drug users.

She wears a T-shirt that says "Clean Needles Save Lives," and has with her 
a book called "How to Stop Time: Heroin From A to Z." Around one wrist are 
Buddhist prayer beads that the 48-year-old Cazadero resident uses for 
meditation.

She will leave shortly for a private home just outside this tiny town to 
help other volunteers set up shop: bags filled with unused needles, kits 
that have clean water and bleach, literature that tells drug users where to 
get help.

She wears rubber gloves during the two-hour shift but never handles dirty 
needles, which are placed into a box marked bio-hazard by the users 
themselves, who start arriving promptly at six.

Her job: to pass out bags containing bundles of 10 new needles, one for 
each dirty needle turned in. The work is easy. The emotions are not.

"There's so much prejudice against this service," she said, acknowledging 
the controversy surrounding needle exchange programs. "We already have one 
(county) supervisor against us. They could say we're starting people on drugs."

County supervisors have provided about $30,000 annually to help needle 
exchange efforts over the past four years. When the funding was last 
renewed, Supervisor Paul Kelley cast the lone vote against the proposal, 
saying that it was bad public policy to provide people with "instruments of 
their own destruction."

Seitz doesn't see it that way.

"I'm saying these people have an illness," she said. "This is a public 
health issue."

By volunteering, Seitz willingly enters the debate surrounding needle 
programs, which supporters say curb the spread of diseases like AIDS and 
Hepatitis C but critics argue encourage drug use.

When she told friends about her work, a few wrinkled their noses. She had 
doubts, too.

"I thought, 'Would I be able to do this?' I didn't know any IV drug users 
myself."

She said she's never injected drugs and didn't know anyone who did when she 
signed on with the Sonoma County Hepatitis, AIDS and Risk Reduction 
Program, or SHARP, in 1998.

Back then it was an underground program because handing out needles was 
illegal in Sonoma County. The risk of being arrested, however, didn't deter 
Seitz, who earned her stripes in civil disobedience in the 1960s while 
attending college in San Francisco and protesting against the Vietnam War.

In her mind, volunteering to hand out needles is a small way of protesting 
the so-called "War on Drugs," which she views as misguided and harmful.

Possessing a needle without a prescription remains illegal, but a change in 
California law last year allows counties to offer needle programs if they 
declare a health emergency, which Sonoma County did.

Sharing dirty needles is a major risk factor for transmitting diseases such 
as AIDS, said Debra Thompson, a program manager with the Drug Abuse 
Alternatives Center, the private nonprofit group that runs the needle 
exchange program.

Last year, 5,000 people swapped needles through SHARP at sites in 
Guerneville, Santa Rosa and Agua Caliente.

They were aided by Seitz and 24 other program volunteers. Thompson said 
more volunteers are needed, and don't have to hand out needles if they 
don't want to.

"I never pressure anyone to do anything that doesn't feel comfortable," she 
said. "I provide them with lots of training and we meet once a month."

About half of the volunteers who work for the program are former addicts 
who must be clean for at least two years to participate. The other half are 
people like Seitz, who are drawn to help through altruism.

Seitz makes her living as a consultant to businesses and individuals in the 
Chinese art of Feng Shui and teaches a community course at Santa Rosa 
Junior College. She also volunteers making quilts that are sold to raise 
money for the Fort Ross Fire Department and is a graduate of the Santa Rosa 
Citizens Police Academy.

Her initial jitters about the needle program aside, she says she's never 
felt any danger while volunteering and the mood is rarely grim.

"We very much enjoy each other," she said. "It's not at all somber. People 
aren't furtively sneaking in and out with their needles."

In Guerneville, a man who supports the needle program donates the use of 
his garage where the exchange takes place every Wednesday from 6 to 8 p.m. 
Besides clean needles, visitors are offered on-site HIV testing and can 
talk to outreach workers about getting help for their addictions.

When she first started volunteering with the program, Seitz drove two hours 
round-trip from Cazadero to Santa Rosa each week. Her commute has been 
shortened with the Guerneville program, but she's no less committed to the 
cause.

"The IV drug users are helping me," she said, explaining her motivation. 
"They're helping me to open my heart."
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