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What They Say About Us

Below are some excerpts from news articles about PHRA:

The Stranger

Shot Up: Funding Cuts Threaten Growing Needle Exchange Program

On a recent evening in a University District alley, two men in sunglasses sat behind a card table loaded with red bins of alcohol swabs, hypodermic syringes, and other supplies for shooting up drugs. Every few minutes, someone would wander up the alley to turn in used needles, take a few items from the bins, and move on.

The table is King County's last privately operated needle-exchange site. But its clientele is growing faster than at any other site in the county.

The syringe exchange in the alley used to be operated five days a week by another group, Street Outreach Services (SOS), until SOS lost county funding last year for failing to submit an audit on time. After SOS went away, the People's Harm Reduction Alliance (PHRA) took over the exchange and expanded it to seven days a week. "We felt [drug users] needed more access in the north end," PHRA director Shilo Murphy says. The group now operates the table 365 days a year with the help of about 25 volunteers. By the end of the year, PHRA predicts it will have increased syringe exchanges by one-third to one million syringes - a 10 percent increase overall from last year for the entire county.

"My hope is that when drug users make the choice to be sober, that they can do it without having HIV or hepatitis C, which would affect them for the rest of their lives," Murphy says...

View full article here: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/shot-up/Content?oid=621925



Real Change

Sticking With The Program

"Never back down. Never grow old."

Shilo Murphy says he used to hear those words from fellow heroin users on the streets of Seattle's University District. Today, 32 and clean, Murphy shares the motto, and much more, with users whose lives he tries to save from behind a table in a U District alley.

The table, and the struggling program it represents, is not only the only needle exchange north of the city's Ship Canal, it is now the last independent, community-run needle exchange left in Seattle - a feat that Murphy pulled off with the help of some dedicated volunteers after the county killed the program's contract last year.

The exchange, which allows addicts to turn in used syringes for new ones to prevent the spread of disease, had been run through Street Outreach Services, a 16-year-old organization that managed the Capitol Hill and U District needle exchanges. But last July, after SOS failed to complete a required audit, Public Health - Seattle & King County cut funding for the organization.

The department started running the Capitol Hill site, which it had already operated two days a week. But Murphy, who had managed both sites for SOS, was determined to keep the U District exchange independent - a critical factor, he says, in maintaining a program that offers users respect and welcomes them as both participants and volunteers in an effort to change habits and lives.

Though he lost his own salary, Murphy never missed a beat: Using leftover Public Health supplies and a church office already paid for by SOS, he and longtime volunteers carried on the program unfunded, formed a board, christened their organization the People's Harm Reduction Alliance, and pushed paperwork through the IRS to get nonprofit status in a scant two week...

View full article here: http://www.realchangenews.org/index.php/site/archives/2343/



The Daily of UW

U-District Needle Exchange to Add Access to Anti-Overdose Drug

Located in the U-District just west of campus is Seattle's last independent needle exchange run by the People's Harm Reduction Alliance (PHRA). The organization has received a $13,000 grant from Street Outreach Services to start a program to give intravenous drug users access to the drug Naloxone.

Currently available only by a doctor's prescription, Naloxone is an opiate antagonist that can stop the effects of a heroin or morphine overdose.

"Most of our patrons don't feel comfortable going to their doctor, admitting they have an addiction to heroin and asking for a prescription for the Naloxone," said PHRA treasurer Tom Fitzpatrick. "We want to make it possible for users to get the drug without having to visit their doctor."

By applying the Collaborative Practice Agreement, which allows pharmacists to initiate and adjust drug therapy with a physician's authorization, people may get Naloxone without ever seeing a doctor, Fitzpatrick explained. Collaborative practice has also granted patients access to emergency contraceptives.

PHRA is the first needle exchange in the state to try to include a Naloxone program as part of their services.

"The program is too political and [King County] doesn't have the money to do it," PHRA director Shilo Murphy said. "This is why we have remained independent."

View full article here: http://dailyuw.com/2009/1/14/u-district-needle-exchange-add-access-anti-overdos/