Report Documents Expanded Focus of New York City`s Syringe Exchange

A data report outlining the past decade of activities within New York City's syringe service programs (SSPs) demonstrates a steady increase in their core function and the continued expansion of their mission into a broad range of healthcare and referral services.

Among the findings of the report released this month by the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene:

• More than half of the 16.950 unique individuals who received non-syringe services from SSPs in 2018 received health education, and more than half received take-home naloxone for opioid overdose reversal. (A total of 18,274 unique participants received syringes from New York City SSPs last year.)

• Of the participants receiving non-syringe services, 10% received hepatitis B and C screening, 9% received education and counseling about hepatitis treatment, and 12% received referrals to medical care and/or support services.

• Nine of the city's 14 SSPs now provide buprenorphine treatment for opioid use disorder on site.

“When services are on site, people utilize them,” Denise Paone, senior director of research and surveillance in the department's Bureau of Alcohol and Drug Use, tells Addiction Professional.

Paone says this is the city agency's first comprehensive report on the city's syringe service programs, which were authorized in the early 1990s as an emergency response to the HIV/AIDS crisis. She says the city plans to issue such reports regularly in the future, and she believes the data could help make the case for increased funding support for the harm reduction-focused operations.

Overall, the report shows that SSPs distributed 4.5 million syringes in 2018, a 127% increase from 2008 numbers. In 2008, state officials broadened the exemption from drug paraphernalia laws that allows the programs to operate, deciding to authorize Peer Delivered Syringe Exchange (PDSE) by non-program staff working within their social network.

PDSE was responsible for 22% of all syringes dispensed in the city in 2018, although the level reached as high as 31% in 2012. “The peer-delivered service is an important piece of what's going on,” says Paone.

A harm reduction focus is prominent in much of the city behavioral health agency's programming, as evidenced by its recent media campaign on fentanyl that targeted drug users' typical using behaviors.