Senators should stop blocking life-saving legislation that would allow people to purchase syringes and municipalities to set up needle-exchange programs.

State senators in the Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee have a chance to help bring New Jersey in line with every other state fighting the insidious spread of AIDS. They should approve two bills today to give drug users legal access to clean syringes. That would allow the bills to proceed to the full state Senate. If that happens, and it should, every senator should seize this opportunity to curb the spread of the AIDS epidemic through New Jersey.

These bills have been unfairly stuck in committee too long by opponents who self-righteously offer those at risk law-and-order nonsense. The spread of HIV is a health problem and it demands a proven approach to help contain it -- not Chicken Little predictions long discredited.

Senate committee opponents -- notably Ronald Rice, D-Newark, whose Essex County district has the most HIV/AIDS cases in the state, and U.S. Senate candidate Thomas Kean Jr. -- contend that giving addicts a chance to avoid contracting HIV through needles would encourage continued illegal drug use.

Ten years ago, Connecticut was one of the first states to allow municipalities and community groups to exchange addicts' dirty needles for clean ones. Its program has not resulted in more injection-drug use, but HIV transmission through needles has fallen. If law enforcement was all it took to end illegal drug use and the disease related to this activity, the war on drugs would have been over years ago. It's time to get real about how to wean people from illegal drugs and protect them and their loved ones from HIV, hepatitis and other blood-borne diseases.

Lawmakers, such as Kean, contend that New Jersey should stick to education and treatment efforts. That sounds right, but lawmakers have not provided enough funding to expand the woefully small number of treatment slots for addicts.

Certainly, needle exchanges are no panacea for the AIDS epidemic. But it can make a significant inroad into stopping the spread of the disease for relatively little cost.

In New Jersey, injection-drug use accounts for 25 percent to nearly 40 percent of HIV cases in the municipalities with some of the highest infection rates. Drug users often put their partners at risk, helping to increase heterosexual transmission, which is another top route of infection in New Jersey.

Clearly, promoting safe sex through educational programs, as Kean urges, and making it easy for addicts to get clean needles could substantially reduce HIV transmission in New Jersey.

New Jersey already has education programs in place. It's long overdue for the state to expand drug treatment and take that crucial step to curb HIV transmission through dirty needles.

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