Health Risks Among PWID and Their Communities
At the individual level, high frequency of sharing syringes and other
drug-use equipment elevates the infection rate of blood-borne diseases
and other infectious diseases among PWID. A report written by Wejnert
et al. (2016) posted on the CDC website revealed that 54 percent of
PWID shared syringes. After injection, residues such as blood, pieces of
tissue, even viruses and bacteria may contaminate the syringe or other
injection equipment. Therefore, if the second person or even more
people use the same syringe, this syringe can provide a portable way for
viruses and bacteria to infect the other persons. A document from the
CDC (2020c) warned that the HIV virus can stay alive in a used syringe
more than 40 days, and an HIV negative individual can have a 1 in 160
chance to be infected by using a syringe which was used by an HIV
positive person. PWID may inject multiple times per week or even per
day, so if PWID have unhygienic injection practices constantly, the
infection rate will increase dramatically. According to the CDC (2020b),
in 2018, PWID counted for 7% of total new diagnoses of HIV. Drug
injection is also a common and major risk factor for viral hepatitis,
especially the hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV),
since they can be transmitted through blood and body fluid. In 2016,
34.4 % and 68.6% of new diagnoses of HBV and HCV were PWID
(CDC, 2019b). Moreover, PWID are more likely to encounter other
infectious diseases, such as MRSA (methicillin-resistant staphylococcus