Texas is the only state in the U.S. that still does not have a needle-exchange program, but one 73-year-old lay chaplain is risking arrest to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS among drug users, the Los Angeles Times reported Jan. 28.

Bill Day, who has AIDS and heads the Bexar Area Harm Reduction Coalition, was recently arrested and faces up to a year in prison for distributing clean needles to addicts. But Day says the ban on needle-exchange programs is immoral and that he will continue his work.

"This is a moral imperative," said Day. "I come from a family of altruistic people. My mother made clothes for the poor during the Depression. My father never turned down a hobo. I have to keep doing what I think is right."

The U.S. Surgeon General said a decade ago that needle-exchange programs were effective public-health interventions, but many skeptics continue to assert that the programs encourage illicit drug use.

Neel Lane, a San Antonio lawyer who is representing Day pro bono, said that Texas needs to join the rest of the country in accepting needle exchanges. "When you're the only state that doesn't have [a needle-exchange program], you're either the 2% smartest or 2% dumbest in the country," he said. San Antonio is slated to become the site of Texas' first needle-exchange pilot program, but it has not been established yet.