Scott County's HIV crisis "may reveal a terrifying future for public health in America."

Earlier today:

"State Representative Ed Clere will be a featured guest speaker at the Southern Indiana PRIDE Launch Event next Thursday October 11th, 2018."

Last year:

Mike Pence minced in The New Yorker: "(Ed) Clere remains bitter about Pence."

And a year before that:

Prayer, needles and Pence. Radical Christian extremists, be gone.

I've said it before and will say it again: As a lifelong Hoosier, I'm compelled to warn those of you currently existing on an steady diet of "Impeach Trump" that waiting in the wings is someone far worse, primarily because Mike Pence actually believes the religious mumbo-jumbo to which The Donald pays only bored lip service.

Mike Pence Is Still to Blame for an HIV Outbreak in Indiana—but for New Reasons, by Steven W. Thrasher (The Nation)

The avoidable Scott County epidemic may reveal a terrifying future for public health in America.

 ... The disaster in Scott County was not just a failure of clean needles or even just Indiana’s long-time “abstinence stressed” sexual education. It was a disaster born of a total abdication of Indiana’s public-health responsibility—and it’s the kind of health disaster we could see nationally. Pence is now vice president in an administration that is gutting HIV/AIDS resources and further criminalizing drug use—two paths that will increase HIV prevalence across the country. Meanwhile, the twin crises of deindustrialization and rising opioid usage mean that the conditions for localized HIV epidemics are not unique to Scott County. Indeed, Gonsalves and Crawford write that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention believes there are “220 counties across the USA at risk of outbreaks of HIV” and hepatitis C ...

... Gonsalves and Crawford’s study of Scott County shows that preventable epidemics can happen anywhere where austerity is combined with theocratic, anti-science policies. As public-health approaches are abandoned throughout the United States, that applies to increasingly large swaths of the country.

Prayer, needles and Pence. Radical Christian extremists, be gone.

Mike Pence: Radical Christian Extremist (photo credit Patheos)

"In the face of a growing epidemic, Mr. Pence put aside his own moral opposition to giving syringes to drug users to allow a needle exchange program."
--- New York Times

I'm of the generation unable to read these words without recalling a beloved, iconic Ronald Reagan, steadfastly ignoring the AIDS epidemic not for a few months, but more than a few years.

I'm of the secular cohort unable to fathom why prayer is required to interpret science.

I'm of the local constituency of Ed Clere's, who gets good (and deserved) press here, and will be getting my vote this November in his bid to serve a fifth term in the Indiana House.

Mike Pence’s Response to H.I.V. Outbreak: Prayer, Then a Change of Heart, by Megan Twohey (NYT)

AUSTIN, Ind. — On the evening of March 24, 2015, Sheriff Dan McClain got an unexpected voice mail: “This is Gov. Mike Pence calling. I would welcome the opportunity to get your counsel on what’s going on in Scott County.”

What was going on was unprecedented in Indiana and rare in the United States: H.I.V. was spreading with terrifying speed among intravenous drug users in this rural community near the Kentucky border. Local, state and federal health officials were urging the governor to allow clean needles to be distributed to slow the outbreak.

But Indiana law made it illegal to possess a syringe without a prescription. And Mr. Pence, a steadfast conservative, was morally opposed to needle exchanges on the grounds that they supported drug abuse.

And this:

On March 23, more than two months after the outbreak was detected, Mr. Pence said he was going to go home and pray on it. He spoke to the sheriff the next night.

Two days later, he issued an executive order allowing syringes to be distributed in Scott County.

But this:

State Representative Ed Clere, a Republican who was among those pushing the governor to approve the needle exchange, said he was relieved when Mr. Pence finally did so. He also wished it had been done sooner. “It was disappointing that it took so much effort to bring the governor on board,” Mr. Clere said.

Yes, disappointing. I'll be praying that Pence loses the national race, too. Forget Trump; I'm worried about Indiana foisting its state nightmare on the country at large.

"Indiana could have avoided HIV outbreak," but Mike Pence was busy being all fundamentalist and shiz.

"Indiana could have avoided HIV outbreak," but Mike Pence was busy being all fundamentalist and shiz.

As an opening aside, best wishes to Lexy Gross as she decamps for law school. She's been doing a fine job covering our area for the C-J.

In this, one of her last dispatches, we are reminded that Mike Pence enjoyed governing from the pages of his Old Testament, and it took sensible members of his own party -- our own Ed Clere -- to treat matters of public health as ... exactly what they are.

Clere and Zoeller instrumental in Pence's needle exchange turnaround.

Which reminds me: I need to get to work on that endorsement of Clere for re-election.

Indiana could have avoided HIV outbreak, study shows, by Lexy Gross (C-J)

Not only was the nationally publicized HIV crisis in rural Indiana last year preventable, but other U.S. communities are at high risk for nearly identical outbreaks, according to a recently released study from the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine.

The study also reveals contradictions between what Indiana public health officials think is best for the state and the policies currently in place.

And:

(Indiana Governor Mike) Pence signed an executive order in March 2015 that allowed Scott County to implement an emergency needle exchange for 30 days, although he still expressed his opposition of the programs. In May of that year, Indiana Rep. Ed Clere, R-New Albany, wrote legislation ending Indiana's ban of syringe exchanges while chairman of the House public health committee. Counties can apply to start a needle exchange program after declaring a public health emergency due to rising HIV or hepatitis C cases.

Clere and Zoeller instrumental in Pence's needle exchange turnaround.

I never hesitate to lob grenades when the GOP goes off the rails (see "Pence, Mike"), so lest we forget, two prominent Indiana Republicans from right here in Floyd County were instrumental in doing the right thing in Scott County.

HAYDEN: Conservatives changed Pence’s mind on needle exchange, by Maureen Hayden (CNHI)

 ... Back in early March, as HIV numbers spiked in Scott County, Pence stopped state health officials from distributing “harm reduction” kits stocked with needle-cleaning supplies such as bleach, cotton, and alcohol wipes.

By the end of the month, conservative Republicans from communities near the HIV epicenter had convinced him that the situation was dire enough to set aside ideology.

They pushed him to take a first step — declaring a 30-day emergency that cleared the way for a limited exchange in Scott County wherein health officials could get clean needles into the hands of HIV-infected drug users.

Pence resisted.

House Public Health Committee Chairman Ed Clere, R-New Albany, wanted more. He filed a measure to let local health officials expand needle exchanges to other communities where IV drug use is fueling a fast rise in Hepatitis C — a blood-borne disease that often accompanies HIV.

Pence continued to resist.

To counter Pence’s argument that needle exchanges enable drug users — an argument echoed by prosecutors — Republican Attorney General Greg Zoeller went public with his support.

“I’m not going to have anybody put to death with HIV just because they’ve broken the law,” said Zoeller. By the time he made that statement, he had been lobbying both lawmakers and the governor’s staff to support Clere’s needle exchange bill.

Politically, Pence is a waste of human flesh. Kudos to Clere and Zoeller for being human. Every little bit helps, doesn't it?