Indiana News

Indiana Official to Testify in Congress About HIV Outbreak

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) – Indiana's health commissioner is set to testify before Congress about Indiana's largest HIV outbreak and the drug abuse that's behind that epidemic.

State Health Commissioner Dr. Jerome Adams was scheduled to testify Thursday morning before the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations. That hearing will focus on what states are doing to combat the national epidemic of prescription painkiller abuse.

Health officials from Colorado, Massachusetts and Missouri will also testify.

Adams' office says he'll discuss Indiana's HIV outbreak that's tied to needle-sharing among intravenous drug users, most of whom injected a liquefied form of the painkiller Opana.

Nearly all of Indiana's outbreak cases have occurred in Scott County, about 30 miles north of Louisville, Kentucky.

State officials say 158 people have tested positive for HIV since December in that outbreak.

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