{"id":3209,"date":"2009-07-26T16:13:43","date_gmt":"2009-07-26T15:13:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=3209"},"modified":"2009-07-26T16:13:43","modified_gmt":"2009-07-26T15:13:43","slug":"alert-after-children-scratched-by-needles-police-in-dont-touch-warning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2009\/07\/alert-after-children-scratched-by-needles-police-in-dont-touch-warning\/","title":{"rendered":"Alert after children scratched by needles; Police in ‘don’t touch’ warning"},"content":{"rendered":"

Children in heroin-plagued Ballymena have been “scratched” by discarded hypodermic needles – prompting police to issue an alert as fears mounted about the potential spread of deadly diseases like Aids.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

The PSNI in the Antrim town – which per-head-of-population has one of Northern Ireland’s worst drug problems – called on parents to advise their children not to touch such needles.<\/p>\n

Police say they have been made aware of incidents in which children have picked up and been scratched by hypodermic needles.<\/p>\n

Said a spokesman: “We are asking parents to impress on their children the importance of never touching discarded needles.<\/p>\n

“Our advice to anyone finding needles is do not touch them, you never know what they might contain.<\/p>\n

“Instead, tell police straight away and we will arrange to have the needles picked up and disposed of.”<\/p>\n

Police can be contacted in Ballymena on 2565 3355.<\/p>\n

Several years ago in Ballymena a number of official ‘needle exchanges’ were set up to allow heroin addicts to safely dispose of needles.<\/span><\/div>\n

It was hoped the scheme would help prevent needles being dumped on the streets over fears that Aids and Hepatitis could be spread to people being pricked by contaminated needles. <\/span>

\nFormer Ballymena mayor Alderman Joe McKernan (Ulster Unionist) said he was shocked to hear that children had their skin scratched by needles.<\/p>\n

<\/span>“If a child’s skin is pierced by a needle in these circumstances it must be a nightmare for parents,” he said.<\/p>\n

“As the police say, who knows what these things could contain, it’s like Russian roulette.<\/p>\n

“You would have to fear the worst until proven otherwise and it could be a long, worrying wait if tests are sought.”<\/p>\n

Source: Belfast Telegraph November 9, 2004 <\/span><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Children in heroin-plagued Ballymena have been “scratched” by discarded hypodermic needles – prompting police to issue an alert as fears mounted about the potential spread of deadly diseases like Aids. The PSNI in the Antrim town – which per-head-of-population has one of Northern Ireland’s worst drug problems – called on parents to advise their children […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-social-affairs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}