FROM THE CAPITOL: Access to Sterile Syringes

By Senator Leland Yee

As the California State Legislative Session came to a close two weeks ago, legislative members await Governor Jerry Brown’s signature on hundreds of bills. Of those, doctors, nurses, and pharmacists have joined AIDS and hepatitis prevention advocates in urging Governor Brown to sign legislation which I authored and introduced to allow pharmacies to sell sterile syringes to an adult without a prescription.
Currently, 47 states allow pharmacists to sell syringes without a prescription. Most states amended their laws in light of overwhelming evidence that criminalizing access to sterile syringes led drug users to share used ones, and that sharing syringes spread HIV, hepatitis B, hepatitis C and other blood-borne diseases that can live in a used syringe.

Under an existing pilot program, pharmacies in Los Angeles County, San Francisco, and some other parts of the state have been allowed to sell syringes without a prescription. This bill, Senate Bill 41 would extend this program to allow pharmacists throughout the state to participate.

 AIDS and hepatitis do not recognize county borders and thus our current policy is not nearly as effective as it should be. It is imperative that the Governor signs SB 41 into law to help reduce healthcare costs to taxpayers and save lives.

Because most states do not require a prescription for syringes, diabetics who visit our state may not even have a prescription and come here assuming they can purchase needles at a pharmacy. This bill will ensure those diabetics or others who need syringes for health purposes will not be stranded here in California without the ability to administer life-saving insulin and other medicines.

The approach in this bill has been evaluated extensively throughout the world and has been found to significantly reduce rates of HIV and hepatitis without contributing to any increase in drug use, drug injection, crime or unsafe discard of syringes. In fact, there is not one published study that refutes these findings.
Sharing of used syringes is the most common cause of new hepatitis C infections in California and the
second most common cause of HIV infections. The state Department of Public Health estimates that approximately 3,000 California residents contract hepatitis C through syringe sharing every year and another 750 cases of HIV are caused by syringe sharing.

These diseases are costly and potentially deadly. Hospitalizations for hepatitis B and hepatitis C cost the state $2 billion in 2007, according to a report by the California Research Bureau. The lifetime cost of treating hepatitis C is approximately $100,000, unless a liver transplant is required, and then the cost exceeds $300,000 per surgery. The lifetime cost of treating HIV/AIDS is now estimated to exceed $600,000 per patient.

SB 41 has been supported by the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and Drug Policy Alliance. As well as the AIDS Project Los Angeles, American Civil Liberties Union, California Hepatitis Alliance, California Nurses Association, California Psychiatric Association, California Retailers Association, County Alcohol & Drug Program Administrators, California Medical Association, California Pharmacists Association, Walgreens, Rite-Aid, City and County of San Francisco, Health Officers Association of California, and Equality California, among others.

Last year, former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a previous version of this bill, SB 1029.