Senate Health considers, passes bill to ban smoking devices in syringe service programs

The Senate Committee on Health and Human Resources, seen on Feb. 27, 2024, advanced a bill Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024, to prohibit syringe service programs from distributing safe smoking supplies to people who use drugs. (Will Price | West Virginia Legislative Photography)

The Senate Committee on Health and Human Resources advanced a bill Thursday to prohibit syringe service programs from distributing safe smoking supplies to people who use drugs.

House Bill 4667 passed the House on Tuesday , and was the first order of business in front of Senate Health following Crossover Day on Wednesday. Lawmakers there spent about two minutes considering the bill, with no discussion, debate or questions of counsel.

The bill — if adopted by the Senate — would add language in state code to the licensure requirements for syringe service programs, which were adopted through legislation passed in 2021 to ban the existence of needs-based services. In order to be licensed under the state Office of Health Facility Licensure and Certification, which is a lengthy and burdensome process but the only legal way to distribute syringes in West Virginia, a program must not distribute smoking devices.

In the proposed code, smoking devices are listed as including but not being limited to: “hand pipes, bubblers, bongs, dab rigs, hookahs, crack pipes or disposable smoking devices.”

The House approved the legislation 88-12 . In committee discussions regarding the bill, lawmakers in that chamber raised concerns about the consequences of further limiting resources provided by harm reduction programs to people who use drugs.

Research has shown that access to safe smoking equipment is especially critical in places where access to clean syringes is limited.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as a number of infectious disease and harm reduction experts, smoking drugs is a safer alternative to injecting drugs, leading to lower rates of overdoses, HIV, hepatitis and other diseases that can be contracted from sharing syringes or using old, broken syringes.

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