CDC Raises Awareness About Safe Injection Practices

ATLANTA — The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), based in Atlanta, launched the One and Only Campaign in April 2012, and discussed it in more depth on Nov. 13 during the organization’s monthly Public Health Grand Rounds webcast.

The campaign, led by the CDC and the Safe Injection Practices Coalition (SIPC) is meant to raise awareness for patients and health care providers about safe injection practices.

Since 2001, more than 150,000 U.S. patients have been notified of possible exposure to hepatitis B virus, hepatitis C virus and HIV as a result of errors in basic infection control practices — most of which involved health care providers reusing syringes and contaminating medication vials used on the since-notified patients, according to the campaign website. These exposures are linked to increasing outbreaks, including the more than 700 patients that were possibly exposed to all three viruses from insulin pens used at a Buffalo, N.Y., veterans hospital, as reported by The Washington Post earlier this month.

The campaign goal is to guarantee that patients are protected every time they receive a medical injection. In doing so, they plan to empower patients and re-educate health care providers on safe injection practices by raising awareness about the topic and encouraging both patients and providers to insist on nothing less than the campaign’s “one needle, one syringe, only one time” slogan — reducing the chance of infection.

Perhaps the biggest opponent to the campaign is the green health care supporters, who are looking to eliminate the amount of medical waste produced — about 7,000 tons a day or 2.5 million tons annually, according to Newsweek. While they’re not supporting the reuse of needles, they do believe that safely resterilizing medical equipment is the best way to reduce hospital waste.

Health care equipment, such as bronchoscopes and endoscopes, is too expensive to throw away after each use, but the reuse of it requires heavily regulated sterilization procedures. In the near future, the same caution and regulations will likely be put into place for more medical equipment as a result of the campaign.