A study published online in the Drug and Alcohol Dependence journal found that the IDEA (Infectious Disease Elimination Act) Exchange, a syringe service program (SSP) in Miami-Dade County, improved proper syringe disposal in the community. The lead author of the study was Harry Levine, an MD/MPH candidate at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine.
The goal was to compare syringe disposal practices among people who inject drugs (PWID) before and after implementing the IDEA Exchange in Miami-Dade, which opened its doors on December 2016. To do this, Levine, Dr. Hansel Tookes, founder of the IDEA Exchange and assistant professor of clinical medicine at the Miller School, and other researchers of the study conducted visual inspection walkthroughs of South Florida neighborhoods with the highest-number of narcotics-related arrests in 2018.
Compared to data from 2009, the findings of the study showed that there was a 49 percent decrease in the number of syringes that were improperly
The results of this study suggest that implementing SSPs in other communities could lead to an increase in proper syringe disposal practices, reducing syringe sharing and risks for developing infectious diseases.
The study was co-authored by students and researchers at the Miller School of Medicine, RTI International, Columbia University, and the Florida Department of Health.
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