A needle exchange program in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom won’t be accepting any more participants. Vermont CARE’s executive director says the moratorium will remain in place until a meeting later this month with state health officials and town representatives. Kendall Farrell says the organization wants to have continued collaboration with the town, which has expressed some concerns about the needle exchange.
The program is designed to provide clean syringes to heroin users who might otherwise reuse or share needles. Organizers want to help prevent the transmission of hepatitis C and HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. Other programs like it already operate in Burlington and Brattleboro.