PSU Magazine Fall 1988

Eye Intravenous drug users will receive this packet from Outside In in exchange for their dirty needles. on the Needle Article and photographs by Cynthia D. Stowell I t is a bonding ritual. It is also one of the most effective ways of transmit– ting AIDS. The sharing of needles and syringes by intravenous drug users has come from behind closed doors and into the public eye. Now that IV drug users have sup– planted male homosexuals as the group in which infection by the AIDS virus is spreading the fastest, international con– cern is keen . This fall , the nation's gaze is fixed on the cities of Portland and New York , where trailblazing and controversial research projects involving the exchange of dirty needles for sterile ones are about to get underway. Heading up Portland's needle exchange experiment, which was the first such ef– fort to be funded in the United States, are a professor and a student from Portland State. Principal investigator Hugo Maynard is an associate professor of psychology at PSU and project director Kathy Oliver is a 1982 PSU graduate cur– rently finishing up her Ph .D. in urban studies. Oliver is the director of Outside In , the community agency where the pro– gram will be based. With funding from the American Foun– dation for AIDS Research (AmFAR) in New York , Maynard and Oliver hope to determine whether the availability of clean needles and syringes, accompanied by condoms and educational information , PSU 17