Needle Exchanges.

[Phluck]

I've heard a bunch of different people's stories about needle exchanges, and they seem to vary a lot from place to place.

I was just wondering what different people's exchanges are like, how they work, what the rules/laws are, what they provide, etc...

I've heard some people mentioning having membership cards and stuff, what's the deal with that?

In my city, the needle exchange is run by the AIDS comittee. I've heard that in some places you only get as many needles as you drop off... so it's an exchange in a very literal sense (which seems kind of odd, 'cause how do you get started?).

At mine, you can take whatever you want. You go in, and have a codename, which I think is pretty much for statistical purposes. Your code name is your year of birth, followed by a name, it can be your first name, a nickname, whatever. So say you go by the name Lefty, and you were born in 1973, you go in and say "I'm 1973-Lefty". They give out sharps containers, so you can keep one at home and put your spent needles in there. If you're bringing one back they'll ask for a rough estimate how how many needles are in there. Then you take whatever you like, they've got 1cc 28 1/2g, 1/2cc, 3cc needles (All BD). They've also got condoms. Those containers of sterile water for injection. Little baggies of teeny cotton balls for filters. Bags of alcohol swabs. Ties for tying off. Vitamin C powder (for crack injection), snorting kits (two little straws, and a condom... for your coke 'n fuck parties, I guess), booklets on all kinds of topics, and probably a few other things I can't think of right now. All free, no questions asked. It's quite the service.

[goagirl23]

The one I go to is AWESOME! Not only can you get up to 500 needles, cottons, condoms, etc. they give out food and drinks etc... Dont ask for your name or age etc. They're awesome

[poppy]

Our needle exchange is now at the clinic where we get our methadone from which is hardly ideal when your script is dependent on giving clean tests and allegedly getting clean so when you are telling your drug worker you aren't using any more but need a load of pins for SWIM so to speak, my drug worker just isn't that stupid. Until recently we had an injectable script, so obviously we needed pins. Now we only have liquid meth so no need for pins. To make things even worse until about six months ago we used to be able to get pins from the chemist where we pick our scripts up from but only in batches of ten which was ok apart from ending up with loads of little black sin bins cos the chemist had no interest in whether you were using or not. For some reason (financial according to the chemist people when I asked them) they stopped doing it so if you want pins its to the meth clinic you have to go. I think this is pretty stupid in terms of harm reduction cos they are encouraging people to use or worse share dirty works cos they don't want the clinic to know what they're up to due to the risk of losing scripts. It seems like we're regressing!!!
Goa girl five years ago we used to get coffee etc and food parcels at christmas, but not any more, all down to nhs cuts apparently. Having said all that we still have it better in the uk than most of you in the us os I shouldn't really be moaning!

[pintosarecool]

In Philly they have an RV type van that comes and parks in a diffirent neighborhood each day of the week. If you don't have any to turn in, they usually just give you ten...but I think if you ask nicely, they'll give you more. Besides the needles, they have metal cookers, little medical cottons that look like tiney little doghnuts, sterile water, bleach for cleaning out rigs, and stuff for cleaning off the area where you want to shoot.
They have at least 5 difirent syringes to choose from, in varying gauges and cc's.
They give you a card to carry around, and it has a personal ID number on it that I can't remember if they scan or not, but anyone can get one, and it only takes a few minutes.
Oh yeah, they also are always trying to give everyone heaps of condoms, and are usually parked in an area wehre drugs are sold openly...and the best part is, cops arn't aloud to come within a certain number of blocks of the needle exchange site. I think that's awsome, because then the bored pigs can't follow people around and hastle them after they get their clean works!