Opinion: Closing an Indiana county’s syringe services program would be a public health disaster
A 6-year-old program that has reduced overdose deaths while simultaneously preventing new cases of HIV in one of the country’s biggest HIV hot spots is under attack by lawmakers. Its closure would be a public health disaster.
Six and a half years ago, the worst drug-fueled HIV outbreak in U.S. history began to emerge in Scott County in southeastern Indiana. By June 2019, 235 people in Austin, a city of approximately 4,300 people in the county, had been diagnosed with HIV. But as devastating as the outbreak was, it could have been much worse.
