The San Francisco Examiner - August 25, 1999
Robert Salladay, Examiner Capitol Bureau

That convoluted system would be swept away under a measure narrowly approved Tuesday by the state Senate and sent to Gov. Davis. The bill authorizes needle-exchange programs like those in San Francisco and Berkeley, and allows doctors and pharmacists working in the programs to distribute needles without a prescription.

If Davis signs the bill, San Francisco and other cities will avoid having to play bureaucratic parlor tricks every 14 days and, supporters say, more timid cities might be encouraged to start their own programs.

San Francisco, Berkeley, Santa Cruz, Marin County and Los Angeles run needle-exchange programs under emergency orders. Contra Costa County and Sacramento officials have said they would implement programs if state law changed.

"It's still an extraordinary way to do what scientists and medical experts know is the right thing to do," said San Francisco public health director Mitchell Katz. "We're elated at passage of the bill, and I hope the governor signs it so we can do this local program without having to declare an emergency."

Davis has not taken a position on the bill, but his spokeswoman, Hilary McLean, said Tuesday: "Based on things the governor has said in the past, he tends to look at the needle-exchange programs as an issue that should be dealt with at the local level, not the state level."

The bill, written by Assemblywoman Kerry Mazzoni, D-San Rafael, does not require needle-exchange programs in every California city. Instead, it allows local governments or public-health officials to start the programs in order to stop the spread of HIV and hepatitis, which can be transmitted through shared contaminated needles.

There is no state money in the measure. San Francisco distributes about 2 million clean needles every year working with a local budget of about $580,000. That money also buys educational materials and referrals to drug treatment programs for anyone willing to listen at the exchange sites.

Mazzoni said her bill, which passed the Senate on Tuesday by a vote of 21-18, was "modest," given several studies showing the public-health benefits of distributing clean needles. In San Francisco, for example, AIDS rates among IV-drug users have remained relatively steady, while cities without needle programs have seen their rates rise dramatically, Katz said.

"This proposal has been before the Legislature on several occasions but was vetoed by then-Gov. Pete Wilson," Mazzoni said. "It's my hope Gov. Davis will see the merits of this important public health policy."

But some members of the Legislature objected to the moral message they said the bill sends, particularly to children. One of the more emotional speeches during debate on the Senate floor came from Sen. Steve Peace, D-El Cajon, who voted against the bill.

"I'm at the point as a parent where I look at my sons and I say to them, "I didn't do cocaine! I didn't do marijuana!' " Peace said. "I almost have to say, "Am I stupid?' "

Standing behind him was Sen. Tom Hayden, D-Los Angeles, nodding his head "yes," as in - yes, you're stupid. There was laughter from the senators and others in the chamber, which angered Peace even more.

"I'll tell you, the fact that we laugh about it is exactly what's wrong. This is about a culture that has trivialized the tragedy of the indulgence in drugs. We are sanctioning the exchange of the implements of death. It's a mistake, and some day we are going to be picking up the carnage.

"I don't know about you," he continued, "but I've got a lot of dead friends who are the victims of these needles. I don't see why the government should get into the business of being the suppliers of these implements of death to my sons' friends or, God forbid, my sons."

Senate President pro tem John Burton, D-San Francisco, then took the microphone to say the Senate had not been laughing at Peace, whom he called one of the smarter lawmakers in Sacramento.

Burton, who carried the bill for Mazzoni in the Senate, said "what we're trying to do here is make sure that when people do a dumb thing, we don't make it a capital offense" by getting AIDS.

"If you think that this sends a message that drug use is all right, you are deeply, deeply mistaken," Burton said. "What we are trying to do is say that even the life of the drug addict has some level of sacredness to it."

Six federally funded studies - by the National Commission on AIDS, the General Accounting Office, the University of California, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Academy of Science and the Office of Technology Assessment - have shown needle programs reduce HIV transmission without increasing drug use.

Nevertheless, Barry McCaffrey, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, has been an outspoken opponent to the programs, which operate in about 100 U.S. cities.

"By handing out needles we encourage drug use," McCaffrey wrote recently. "Such a message would be inconsistent with the tenor of our national youth-oriented anti-drug campaign."

But AIDS-prevention groups throughout the state overwhelmingly supported the Mazzoni bill, which Pat Christen, executive director of the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, said "puts sound public health policy above politics."

"Given the number of HIV infections directly and indirectly associated with injection drug use and the proven effectiveness of needle exchange programs," Christen said, "California cannot afford to ignore this vital prevention tool."
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