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- WASHINGTON /PRNewswire/ -
The confluence of HIV/AIDS, drug abuse, and hepatitis C is becoming a public
health nightmare.
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- HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C are moving at an alarming rate
into the minority community, where the poorest and most vulnerable are
at risk through injection drug use and unprotected sex.
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- To counteract this public health emergency, the Substance
Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's Center for Substance
Abuse Treatment (CSAT), and the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA),
released publications designed to provide information to the public and
health professionals on the intertwined problems of substance abuse and
diseases such as HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C. CSAT released its new Treatment
Improvement Protocol "Substance Abuse Treatment for Persons With HIV/AIDS"
and NIDA released its new "Community Drug Alert Bulletin on Hepatitis
C."
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- The publications were released at a meeting in Baltimore,
"Bringing It All Together", hosted by CSAT, NIDA and the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention. The meeting was called to disseminate
current research-based information about the prevention and treatment of
HIV/AIDS and hepatitis C, focusing on drug users.
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- CSAT's "Substance Abuse Treatment for Persons With
HIV/AIDS" provides the latest information on what is now known about
the intersection of HIV/AIDS and substance abuse. The TIP includes chapters
on demographic trends; what is needed in medical assessments; how to determine
mental health needs; issues for substance abuse counselors, including their
own prejudices; how to integrate services; using a case manager; managing
pain; ethical issues; legal issues and privacy; and funding and policy
considerations.
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- CSAT Director H. Westley Clark, M.D., J.D., M.P.H., noted
that "substance abuse increases the risk of contracting HIV. There
is no question that injection drug users are at great risk. Combine this
with the tendency of substance abusers to engage in risky sexual behaviors
in exchange for drugs or money, and you have a dangerous public health
situation."
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- NIDA's "Community Drug Abuse Bulletin on Hepatitis
C" will provide basic information to the public on hepatitis C that
can lay latent for many years before inflicting permanent liver damage.
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- NIDA Director Alan I. Leshner emphasized that "hepatitis
C is the most common, chronic blood- borne infection in the United States,
and young adults who inject drugs have the highest rate of new infections."
He added that "for this reason, it's very important to get the word
out to health care professionals and the public about how to prevent this
infection, which is estimated to affect 80 percent of the nation's drug
injecting population."
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- The "Bringing It All Together" Conference was
designed to help professionals in substance abuse, primary care, mental
health, and other health specialists, improve coordination of care for
individuals who are suffering from the harm caused by addiction and its
related medical consequences.
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- The goal of the conference was to foster creation of
systems that will advance integration of best practices in prevention,
outreach, assessment, case management, medical treatment and monitoring
to ensure that people with drug problems who are at risk for, or have contracted
chronic infections, timely, coordinated and comprehensive delivery of treatment
services.
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- Leading experts from across the country discussed prevention
and treatment of HIV and hepatitis among drug users in various settings--
from communities to prisons. Issues included the impact of drug use-related
HIV and/or hepatitis among adolescents, women, the aging, criminal offenders
and families. Emphasis was placed on finding practical, culturally relevant
methods to reach drug users such as motivational interviewing, psychodrama
and effective case management.
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- The conference featured workshops on specific challenges
such as compliance with treatment, mental health problems, maintaining
confidentiality, engaging families and coping with death and dying.
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- The meeting is expected to lead to creation of a national
coalition of outreach workers involved in prevention activities with drug-using
populations.
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- Contact: Leah Young of CSAT, 301-443-3740;
- or Michelle Muth of the National Institute on Drug Abuse,
301-594-6245;
- or for Meeting: Tammy Nunnally of CDC, 678-596-6918
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- Link
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- Comment
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- From Sheryl Jackson
- MoonFyre@thegrid.net 5-17-00
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- I am appalled that so many people believe erroneously
that the reason Hep C is so widespread in this country is because of drug
use. It is the fruit we get from South America and Latin America. You
don't think they have Port-a-Potties in the fields down there do you?
No, they do not and the people who work the fields just squat when they
have to go to the bathroom. Mexico doesn't have them either.
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- Less than 2 percent of the fruit we get from down below,
is checked. 40 million people have Hep C in this country. Most of them
are not aware. It can lie dormant for years without an acute episode.
Most people do not exhibit the overt symptomology of the disease. Those
of us who do get Hep C are treated like lepers in the medical world and
it is commonly believed by the medical community that we got it from IV
drug usage.
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- Remember the strawberries that get quarantined every
other year? It is not the California grown strawberries that cause it,
or even the Texas fruit. But the government wants us to support a global
economy, that is wiping out American Sovereignty so they do not want it
widely known that American fruit, the best on the planet is sold in Europe
and England, is sold for $6-10per pound. Ain't NAFTA great? The poor
die over here so the rich over there can live well and healthily for the
rest of their lives.
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- First, congress approved all of the loopholes that Corporations
use, on the premise they provide jobs, then they deregulated the Utilities.
We are the only industrialized nation that has not got cost effective
nuclear energy. We wrote the specifics of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission,
and we are the only country that does not follow the NRC regulations.
Now Congress allowed the corporations to go overseas taking jobs with
them, while allowing the companies to go ahead and receive the same loopholes
they had when they kept their companies here. Also congress does not
charge them more excise taxes when they send the product over here to be
sold. I would also note that they did not lower the prices here for their
products that are now so cheaply made.
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- So, basically, for the past 25 years the Repugnant Party
has moved toward a New World Order, thereby villifying the poor, the sick,
the elderly and children for the problems we have here, and Capitalists
are more interested in the money of the rich around the world, as they
now approve 300,000 immigrants to come into this country to take our jobs
as "skilled labor". What the hell does Skilled Labor mean?
Why do we have no skilled labor here when we have so many people who are
now unemployed and unable to find a full 40 hour week of work????????
What about all the training that the corporations are giving away at entry
level jobs? Nowhere in the agreement does it state that they must then
employ those they train. They do not employ the trainees for long, because
companies get money from the government just to train the entry level
employees. Unions have been busted.
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- In my world, if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck,
quacks like a duck, then New World Order smacks of The Third Reich.
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- Oxymorons: Nuclear Medicine, LongTermEntryLevelJobs,
American Sovereignty, Compassionate Conservative and Nazi Party. S
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- heryl Jackson MoonFyre@thegrid.net
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