節欲-戒毒？

從公共衛生的觀點看，戒煙和禁毒是人們追求的目標。可是，全世界千百萬的煙民和無數的吸毒者耽溺於煙鹼和海洛因，不能達到人們期望禁絕的目標。事實上，一些人確實自動設法戒煙和停止吸食其他毒品，但是這種例外的事例只能證明一個鐵律：把告戒人們禁毒作為一個普遍的預防策略是無效的。 

面對這種現實，許多衛生健康專家於是建議，在靜脈毒品注射者需要的時候，給他們發放免費注射針頭，不失為預防HIV感染的最好的辦法。足量發放消毒針頭能夠減少非常危險的“共用針頭”。這些策略已經在一些地方被運用和獲得了成功，足以證明衛生專家判斷的正確性。

Abstinence - Abstinence from Drug Use?

From the standpoint of public health, it would be desirable that people abstain from smoking and injecting drugs. However, millions of smokers all over the world and countless thousands if intravenous drug users are addicted to nicotine or heroin and thus are incapable of the desired abstinence. It is true that some individuals do manage to stop smoking and give up other drugs on their own, but these exceptions only prove the rule: As a general prevention strategy, preaching abstinence to drug users is ineffective.

Facing this reality, many health experts therefore recommend that intravenous drug users be given free injection needles on demand as the best way to protect them against HIV infection. Clean needles in sufficient quantities can reduce the very dangerous “needle sharing”. Where these policies have been implemented, they have proved successful enough to justify their continuation.