Pubdate: Sun, 07 Aug 2016
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2016 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Maia Szalavitz
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v16/n517/a07.html

TREATING HEROIN ADDICTS

Naloxone saves lives after a heroin overdose, but does it also 
encourage addiction?

To the Editor: The same arguments about encouraging more risk taking 
were made earlier about needle exchange programs to fight H.I.V., 
delaying their implementation by years. But when New York State 
stopped heeding the naysayers and did expand access to clean needles, 
H.I.V. infection rates in drug users, which had stood at 54 percent 
in 1990, fell to only 3 percent by 2012. Now state health officials 
call the formerly contentious practice "the one intervention which 
could be described as the gold standard of H.I.V. prevention." Let's 
not make the same mistake by spreading similarly baseless fears about naloxone.

MAIA SZALAVITZ

New York

The writer is the author of "Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way 
of Understanding Addiction."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom