Family Drug Support PO Box 226 Willoughby NSW Telephone 9818 6166 - 1300 368 186 -0412 414 444 Family Drug Support is extremely concerned about the threat to the NSW needle and syringe program posed by the closure of the Caroline Lane service. We do not believe this sort of knee jerk reaction will have any impact what so ever on drug misuse in the State and will definatly lead to far greater problems, including sharing of needles and increasing the risk of HIV and Hep C infection and ultimately more premature deaths. Further, the community needs to look at why these programs were initiated in the mid 1980's -which was to prevent the spread of HIV among intravenous drug users. After 12 years NSW has less than 10% HIV among IDUs, compared to other parts of the world with rates of over 70 % where no needle programmes exist We are the envy of most countries in this particular aspect of drug policy. Obviously the sight of a young person using a needle to inject heroin causes great distress and we know only too well this is disastrous for the family involved and agree that our society needs to do more to protect young people from early entry into drug using. We welcome the suggestion by Kerry Chickarovski for a bi-partisan approach and to set up an independent committee to inquire into the effectiveness of needle and syringe exchange programs. We believe that committee should be headed by Dr Roger Garcia from the RPA Hospital - a world-renowned immunologist and our organisation would welcome a position on that committee. Tony Trimingham- Family Drug Support <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>