North Side residents raise concerns about city's needle exchange program
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — It's supposed to be a needle exchange program.
The city and other organizations give people addicted to drugs clean syringes to prevent them from getting HIV and other blood infections. But they're not exchanged at all. They're simply discarded.
Step carefully through an abandoned homeless encampment on the North Side, and you'll see them amid the abandoned tents, blankets and garbage. Syringes, distributed by the city and others, used for the safe injection of heroin and then simply thrown away, presenting a danger to anyone who comes near
"It's littered with needles," Nick Santillo of the North Side said. "Everywhere you walk, it's a hazard now."
They are here in this encampment, along the riverfront trails, in alleyways and even on street corners. Anywhere where addicts decide to use intravenous drugs in the city. And residents like Santillo want the city to do something about it.
"If you're going to hand out free needles, they need to have a responsibility to re-collect them," he said.
A year ago, Mayor Ed Gainey announced the creation of the city's needle exchange program. The idea is to supply addicts with clean syringes to prevent them from contracting HIV or Hepatitis C but have them either return the used ones or drop them into safe boxes.
While the city's program is still only in limited operation, it has partnered with Prevention Point Pittsburgh, which distributes clean syringes from offices and vans. But the city concedes the lack of disposal has created a problem.
"We've learned a lot in the past year about what is working, what is not working. And we're evaluating," press secretary Maria Montano said.
That would be a new effort to clean these sites and re-capture these syringes after they're used.
"Providing folks in those areas with Sharps boxes for safe disposal and working through a plan on how we can go through and pick up those and keep those areas safe for everybody," Montano said.