World Health Organization Calls For Decriminalization of Drug Use 474
An anonymous reader writes: We've known for a while: the War on Drugs isn't working. Scientists, journalists, economists, and politicians have all argued against continuing the expensive and ineffective fight. Now, the World Health Organization has said flat out that nations should work to decriminalize the use of drugs. The recommendations came as part of a report released this month focusing on the prevention and treatment of HIV. "The WHO's unambiguous recommendation is clearly grounded in concerns for public health and human rights. Whilst the call is made in the context of the policy response to HIV specifically, it clearly has broader ramifications, specifically including drug use other than injecting. In the report, the WHO says: 'Countries should work toward developing policies and laws that decriminalize injection and other use of drugs and, thereby, reduce incarceration. ...Countries should ban compulsory treatment for people who use and/or inject drugs." The bottom line is that the criminalization of drug use comes with substantial costs, while providing no substantial benefit.
Finally! (Score:5, Insightful)
The war on drugs failed only.... (Score:5, Insightful)
...if its goal was to prevent drug usage.
Re:The war on drugs failed only.... (Score:5, Insightful)
...if its goal was to prevent drug usage.
It's been a rousing success for the law enforcement and prison industries though!
Re:It's finally time to do it (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:No public drug use (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No public drug use (Score:5, Insightful)
Disagree. The point of legalizing drugs is to prevent an underground supply. The rationale is quite simple: You're not going to stop people from taking drugs. Someone is going to profit from supplying those drugs, so there is either going to be a legal source or an illegal source. A legal source is better than an illegal source.
Anyone selling drugs should be required to inform the users about the risks and consequences. If you still want to take up an addictive drug, that's your own damn fault. It's been proven over and over again that you can't prevent people from taking drugs, so that cannot be the objective. The rational objective is to protect others from the effects of drug use (no second hand smoke, keeping intoxicated people off the streets, etc.)
Re:It's finally time to do it (Score:5, Insightful)
No, this is the old "Reefer Madness" mentality, meant to make happy both the Puritans and the prison profiteers while keeping the politicians in an elevated state of power.
What actually happens, and Portugal ran this experiment with a sample size of over 8 million people during the past decade, is that when drug use is decriminalized, the usage rate quickly falls to about half.
Most of those are people who are no longer afraid to seek treatment. Some are folks who wind up court-ordered to get treatment, and a few were drug users who were only doing it because drugs seemed cool because they were illegal.
At the end, though, the incontrovertible fact is that the community has half the number of drug users as it did under Prohibition. Prohibitionists are responsible for a doubling of the drug usage rate in the community. Does that seem counter-intuitive? So what? The data is in.
Drugs were not always illegal in the US (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Safe injection sites (Score:5, Insightful)
The obvious number one downside is the potential for an increase in number of addicts. I never really had the answer for how to counter that. Social stigma? Government monitoring program on those who buy from the "drug store" that encourages rehabilitation? But maybe if you make the harder drugs extra affordable in an outpatient setting like you describe, it offers a way out for the addicts, while making it inconvenient for dabblers and college kids to get into the really nasty stuff. You could still sell (and tax, of course) the less addictive/destructive drugs, as you would alcohol and tobacco.
And bonus points if this reduces violent crime rates by people trying to get money to fuel their need.
HEROIN® brand diamorphine (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:There is no magic bullet (Score:4, Insightful)
Heroin, etc. are dangerous and they weren't just banned because of moralizers.
The 'land of the free and the home of the brave' would not violate people's fundamental liberties for safety. These things are banned because of freedom-hating scumbags who despise the thought of living in a truly free country, and yet pretend that that is their goal. But we have the TSA, the NSA's mass surveillance, constitution-free zones, free speech zones, protest permits, DUI checkpoints, mass warrantless surveillance, unrestricted border searches, and a number of other policiies or agencies that violate the constitution and people's fundamental rights (thanks to people like you), so of course we've never been 'the land of the free.'
Re:Finally! (Score:3, Insightful)
I agree with your comments on this as well. What would we do with all the prison space currently housed by drug-related occupants? That would put a heavy dent in the income of the organizations that manage the prison systems (which are mostly cronies of the politicians). And once the dent is made in their profits, they would lobby to elevate the penalty of some other illegal act to put the profits back into their pockets, say jaywalking or driving while texting is a now mandatory 90 days in prison.
The problem is addiction, not the use of drugs (Score:5, Insightful)
You can be addicted just as easily to legal drugs as to any substance on the federal schedule. You can be addicted to behaviors like gambling and eating. This problem needs to be addressed medically.
Re:There is no magic bullet (Score:4, Insightful)
As someone else pointed out: as counter-intuitive as it might be, the data is in since Portugal ran the experiment [time.com].
Re:No public drug use (Score:5, Insightful)
The rationale behind "not in public" isn't that I don't like it but that drug use has significant deteriorating effects on society and can thus not be allowed to become normal social behavior.
Bullshit. Any truly free country would not infringe upon people's fundamental liberties in the name of safety. Also, have you ever heard of personal responsibility? If someone sees you doing drugs and wants to try them too, then that is *their* problem and no one else's. And I think there are constitutional problems with the drug war, and constitutional problems with banning public drug use.
I have a better idea: Stop trying to control people and just leave them alone. That way, maybe we'll move closer to becoming 'the land of the free and the home of the brave' rather than 'the land of the unfree and the home of the worthless cowards who sacrifice freedom for safety.'
Re:Finally! (Score:5, Insightful)
But that number does not include the likely bigger number of people driven into other crimes because of the illegal nature of their drug addiction. The illegal drug trade not only puts some mostly innocent people in a compromised position, but also fuels the vast majority of crime.
Re:Finally! (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with smoking is not that it harms your health, it's that it harms other people's health, and makes other people's environment less pleasant to be in. That's why smoking is (typically) banned in public places, or near public buildings, but not banned in the comfort of your own home (that said, even there, it can have severe impacts on children/other members of your family).
Re:The war on drugs failed only.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk to the Colombians and Mexicans to see how well that particular strategy has worked out
Re:The problem is addiction, not the use of drugs (Score:4, Insightful)
Even addiction is not a problem. Back in the day when opium was legal, many people were addicted to it. But they had ready access to a cheap supply of their drug of choice, so they were able to function in society, hold down a job, etc.
Caffeine is another good example. Lots of people are addicted to caffeine, but function in society.
Even tobacco (evil though it is) has functional addicts.
The point is that it's not addiction itself that is a problem, but the stigmatization of addicts by society and the crimes they're forced to commit to feed black market pricing. Put an opiate addict on a methadone program, and they stop breaking into houses to feed their habit.
Addiction is not a *good* thing, but it should be a personal choice and health issue, not an excuse for ostracizing someone from society.
Re:Finally! (Score:5, Insightful)
Even if that's the case, how is any of that worse than what we have now?
Re: HEROIN® brand diamorphine (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No public drug use (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, I see a problem with pot cafes. Drug use is not OK, just inevitable
What about cafes that serve coffee? You know, the beverage containing a highly addictive drug? Should we ban those too?
The issue with pot cafes is that it's hard for people to work in them without being exposed to passive smoke, but if you can address that then I don't see the difference between them and normal cafes.
Re:Finally! (Score:5, Insightful)
If someone breaks into a house, they should be in jail for breaking into a house. I know plenty of people who do drugs and *don't* break into houses or commit other crimes. Also, the high prices are driven by the prohibition of drugs. If they were more affordable, it becomes much less of an issue to break into houses or cars to get money.