CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Huntington’s new drug addiction treatment program, set to launch this summer, has a supporter in Dr. Rahul Gupta, West Virginia’s chief health officer and commissioner of the state Bureau of Public Health.
The Cabell-Huntington Health Department will oversee the still-developing program that will include a needle exchange option to stop the spread of infectious diseases during addiction treatment education or recovery support.
On Thursday’s MetroNews “Talkline,” Gupta said he was not opposed to such needle exchange programs that, up to now, have not been used in West Virginia.
What happens in Huntington could lead to similar programs elsewhere, according to him.
“I think that when we are enduring the drug overdose problem, as we know of in West Virginia, it’s very important for us to start looking at every and all options that are available to us that are grounded in evidence, based in science and this is certainly one of the options out there,” Gupta said.
Nationally, he said research has shown no increases in drug usage within communities where such needle exchanges have been offered, but there are indicators of reductions in the spread of infectious diseases.
“It’s important to know that when people are using needles because they are addicted to drugs, there’s (the risk of) a number of diseases. We’re talking about hepatitis C, but also hepatitis B, HIV.”
A recent study from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found hepatitis C cases across four Appalachian states — West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and Virginia — more than tripled between 2006 and 2012.
In 2012, the CDC determined West Virginia had the second highest rate of hepatitis C in the entire country.
Overall, Gupta said the goal must be to save lives.
“We cannot treat this just like another disease whether it’s obesity or high blood pressure. This is special,” Gupta said of drug addiction. “For folks who go through the process of addiction, (they) understand their bodies really are not totally under their control.”