For more than 20 years, local heroin addicts have relied on a collection of needle exchanges for clean works. But in recent months, crack users too have quietly found an outlet in the city.
In a nondescript alley in the University District, users can pick up clean crack pipes, pipe filters and ascorbic acid for injecting crack. Heroin users can also pick up a drug that reverses a heroin overdose — an apparent first for a city needle exchange.
“We take a different philosophy approach than most government institutions or public health departments. They have a budget, and have to pick and choose who they’re going to help,” said Shilo Murphy, executive director of the non-profit People’s Harm Reduction Alliance, which runs the U-District needle exchange.
Public health officials know of no other local program that gives out crack kits or Naloxone, the heroin-overdose reversal drug. But they see the potential benefits.
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