Injection drug users (IDUs) have the lowest chances of accessing syringe exchange programs in rural areas, despite the rising rates of addiction to heroin and other opiates in those parts of the country. Publishing their findings in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, researchers assessed the availability of such programs throughout the United States.

Sixty-nine percent of the programs surveyed were in urban areas, 20 percent were in rural locations, and 9 percent were in suburban areas. A recent study estimated that half of all IDUs live outside urban areas.

The CDC report also found that while 61 percent of syringe exchange programs in urban areas offered naloxone, a drug used to counter the effects of opioid overdose, compared with just 37 percent of programs in rural areas.

To read a press release on the report, click here.

To read the CDC report, click here.