Natural Cure

President Bush signed an omnibus spending bill today that includes a provision that lifts a nine-year ban that has prohibited the nation’s capital from spending its own (non-federal) money on syringe exchange programs. Elimination of this ban clears the way for the Government of the District of Columbia to proceed with plans to infuse $1 million into local syringe exchange efforts.

Many have been outraged or saddened to find out that our revered baseball idols have been taking drugs to enhance performance when it comes to throwing and hitting a baseball. While it is easy to point fingers, caste stones and judge the "cheaters," let's slow down for a moment and take a look in the mirror. We may be surprised to see how much "performance enhancing" goes on all around us.

Impoverished and war-torn Afghanistan is now facing an epidemic of HIV infection owing to its increasing numbers of injecting drug users, many of whom have returned from refugee settings in Pakistan and Iran. Other vulnerable groups are also at high risk of HIV infection. As a low-prevalence but high-risk country, Afghanistan's national authorities recognise HIV control as a major priority.

As we wrap up 2007, DPA Executive Director Ethan Nadelmann would like to personally thank you for your support. This past year has had many challenges and many rewards. We've been able to advance reason, compassion and justice. Have a great holiday season, from our family to yours.

It has been a long, grueling year in DC. Sure we had Senator Larry Craig's "wide stance" to joke about; but there were also a few near catastrophic misses, with the Senate passing two disturbing amendments - one that would have prohibited cities from establishing safe injection sites in the future (why not outlaw flying cars?) and another that possibly could have overturned all state medical marijuana laws (or maybe would have done nothing at all; no one knows what exactly it would have done, including the Senators who voted for it). Fortunately, we beat those amendments back in the House. And we're ending our year of Congressional work on a very high note, so I thought I would share.

First, the omnibus spending bill that Congress passed this week contains a provision repealing the federal ban that prohibits Washington, DC from spending its own (non-federal) money on syringe exchange. This is a major, hard-fought victory that we narrowly won. Rep. Mark Souder almost derailed it earlier this year, but Congress voted 216 to 208 against his amendment. President Bush is expected to sign the omnibus bill sometime before the end of the year. DC's mayor has already pledged to provide hundreds of thousands of public dollars to syringe exchange next year.

Second, the same omnibus bill also cuts funding to the anti-marijuana media campaign from $100 million this year to $60 million next year. This is the biggest one-year cut in the program ever! I'm going to miss those commercials with talking dogs telling their owners how disappointed they are in them for smoking pot.

Third, Bush's hardline on domestic spending not only prevented Democrats from increasing funding to the Byrne grant program but forced them to slash it further. Overall, Byrne grant funding was roughly $500 million this year. Democrats wanted to increase that to $600 million next year. The final omnibus bill appropriates roughly $373 million. Bush's hardline did force Democrats to scale back their increases to treatment funding, but their proposed increases were pretty puny to begin with.

Finally, we're leaving this year in a great position to move crack/powder reform forward next year. There are three bi-partisan reform bills in the Senate. Both Senate Democrats and Republicans want to have hearings early next year and we're optimistic that we can get something out of committee. Earlier this week our Deputy Director of National Affairs, Jasmine Tyler, stood with six members of Congress and representatives from several advocacy groups in support of the House version of the Senate bill, introduced by Rep. Sheila Jackon Lee (D-TX). Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA), chair of the House Crime Subcommittee, announced this week he is introducing his own bill, one that not only eliminates the crack/powder disparity but also eliminates the underlying mandatory minimums. House Democratic leadership is afraid of the issue and House Republicans don't "get it" in the way many of their Senate counterparts do, but the tide is turning towards our side.

Happy Holidays!