The Public Health Impact of Needle Exchange Programs in the United States and Abroad: Summary, Conclusions, and Recommendations

[S]ubstance use plays a major role in the transmission of HIV disease-indeed, a much larger role than has been generally recognized. Clearly, our nation's drug control policies must recognize this inextricable linkage between drugs and HIV disease and be designed to address the two aggressively and simultaneously. -National Commission on AIDS, The Twin Epidemics of Substance Use and HIV, 1991[1] Because neither a vaccine nor a cure for HIV infection appears likely in the near future, planning is needed for the long term to limit the spread of HIV among drug injectors, their sexual partners, and their potential offspring. -National Research Council, AIDS: The Second Decade, 1990[2]