Prohibition Still Doesn't Work

Beer Moth

China has it right: shoot the dealers. Job done.

ndm

I suspect that increased weed smoking is a side effect on the ban on people under the age of 21 in the US buying (and drinking) alcohol. It is far easier for an 18 year old to buy weed illegally than it is for him to buy alcohol allegally.

Furthermore, at least in my town there is essentially no prohibition on him smoking it. A couple of weeks ago I was in a club with some friends one of whom went outside to smoke. The guy on the door told him that he "didn't need to come outside to smoke that" since it wasn't tobacco.

Snowman

methinks there’s no political courage and certainly no political mileage to either tighten up drug policy as implied by Beer Moth @ 7.12 or loosen it. The current plodding approach of shouting wolf a lot, but avoiding a real kick aimed at those got caught must be worse than either from any angle - the cost to the NHS, the level of crime, personal health and stuff.

David Raynes

It is about time the Portugal nonsense was nailed.

In 2005, Portugal had an increase of drug related deaths of more than 30%.

In 2007 the total number of deaths climbed from 216 to 314 cases, representing a colossal 45% raise in drug-related mortality. Roughly one death per day, the highest numbers since 2001.

A lot of the focus by ignorant or casual commentators, or of those with with a barely concealed agenda, is on an age span population of 13 to 19 years old. Little reference to the adjacent 20 to 24 age group that has had a 50% increase in prevalence.

In fact there was an increase in prevalence for every drug category during 1998 to 2002, with cannabis sky-rocketing with a 150% rise.

There is not a single drug category, not one, that has decreased since 2001.

So that is some of the real truth.

Yes, some of the Portuguese action is about cajoling, persuading and firmly pushing drug users into treatment and having more of that available, nothing wrong with that, but note that in the Portuguese model, users are still taken to a Police Station before signing up to treatment.

In the UK and under our Criminal Justice system such action is just not possible without the power of arrest. Indeed arrest and referral to treatment FROM arrest has always been important, since the 60s, BUT effective treatment has to BE there. That has tio include treatment that is just not parking people on methadone.

None of the best aspects of Portugal need decriminalisation in fact decriminalisation is just the latest piece of spin by "user-advocates" of drug legalisation. Some of those user advocates ny now having high social standing in the chattering classes.

It is humbug and it surprising you have fallen for it.

In the UK it is quite difficult to get serious criminal sanctions applied to anyone who is just a user or addict, it has been thus for several years now.

The UK drug problem accelerated from 2000 when interdiction of cannabis was largely stopped and the market exploded (supported by David Blunket and his silly downgrading of cannabis-now reversed). Nations truly do get the drug problem they deserve.

As a frequent commentator on these matters and someone who has studied the scene for 40 years it is quite plain to me that we cannot just ARREST OURSELVES out of our drug problem but that we might well benefit from some far more imaginative civil and social sanctions.

We would certainly benefit from much more determined efforts to delay drug experimentation by a few years or to deter it altogether. Voluntary testing regimes in schools (with some carrot available) could help with that.

Substance misuse (legal or illegal) is an infectious disease of society, in no other disease would we regard prevention of it as quite so unimportant. In no other sphere would County advisors be sayingm to parents, "Of course your kids are going to get infected, don't worry about it".

Da Costa is broadly right. If anyone doubts it, consider the operation of the tobacco/alcohol model as variously applied around the world.

Pot Head

This blog from Mexico on the effects prohibition is having there, should be awake up call to those who believe you can legislate against human nature.

http://www.blogdelnarco.com/

To quote the Christopher Walken Character in 'The King of New York'

"You think ambushing me in some nightclub's gonna stop what makes people take drugs? This country spends $100 billion a year on getting high, and it's not because of me. All that time I was wasting in jail, it just got worse. I'm not your problem. I'm just a businessman. "

Humans want to get high, always have done, aways will do, and the law ain't ever going to stop that!

McD

This talk of taxing and regulating cannabis is all very fine and well, but no-one's going to make any money from it, so I can't really see how anyone expects the situation to fundamentally change with taxed and regulated supply.

As an MS patient of more than twenty years standing whose quality of life is unbearable without cannabis, I’m morally outraged by any suggestion that I should be subject to any restriction whatsoever. I’ve actually used cannabis since 1977, without realising until fairly recently that I’d been self-medicating, in much the same way as a cat will eat grass when it needs to settle its stomach and/or vomit - instinctively.

I'm just lucky to have MS. The disease hasn't yet caused me too much difficulty and I am able to enjoy some control over it with cannabis. Best of all, I love growing cannabis. Not just because of the relief and consequently improved quality of life it provides me, but simply because I love growing the plant. I love watching it grow and looking after it. I can't imagine paying to lose that essential pleasure. For me that pleasure is essential, because I believe the time and attention given to a plant become an integral part of the qualities it develops and is consequently able to offer as medicinal properties.

I think of it like masturbation: what right does anyone else have to tell me when I can have a wank, what sort of. or how many wanks I can have? Most people seem to have pretty much given up on telling others who they should have sex with - male of female, black or white... No-one’s going to get involved. Why should they be any more interested in what I do in the privacy of my own home - in my own kitchen, when everyone is asleep - when it is of absolutely no consequence to anyone else whatsoever? Because I grow my own cannabis (and NEVER sell or give ANY of it to anyone; which is actually a terribly painful shame, because it’s made me into something of a recluse as a result. I’d love to be able to share my understanding of this miraculous plant with others, but, like Byron’s it would seem to be a love that dares not.) It’s not as if I’ve seduced an eighteen-year-old boy. There’s no-one else involved.

I couldn’t care less which hoops are set alight for the jumping through; I will always grow as much cannabis as I need. If there were legal limits, I would try to stay within them, but - now that we all know what a farce the law is - I wouldn’t pay any attention if it wasn’t convenient. Any attempt to climb into my bed and find out which hand I wank with, or whether or not I swap hands and when I do so, and other such private details would be met by me with about the same understanding and appreciation as someone trying to find out how much cannabis I use. You want to make it your business? Then you marry me! (And, if you don't want to be laughed at when you're asked not to let the door hurt your bottom on your way out, you'd better come up with something better to offer than the greed inspired by the thought of subjecting nature's bounty to a system of monetary control, i.e. taxation.) Attempts to subjugate and control nature, particularly at this point on humanity's rather dubious road to prosperity, might not be regarded as desirable by God.

McD

"This author has been told by an anonymous GW employee that the exclusive license was made possible because of Chairman Guy’s personal relationship with former British Prime Minister John Major, who helped broker the company’s exclusive deal with the Home Office. They argue that their lead product, proprietary name Sativex®, is “quite different” from “generic and unrefined cannabis” and that “it cannot be said that all cannabis—or all cannabis extracts—are the same.” Finally, not wanting natural cannabis to share in any of their predicted future legitimization of their extract, they end by saying that “it would be a great irony if generic herbal cannabis were to be removed from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act, and made available for general medical use, based in part on data relating to a specific product [Sativex®].” Is not the real irony that GW would have the plant on which their entire company is based, relegated to the status of irredeemably dangerous drug, while their extract of the plant is blithely elevated to the status of profitable, salable good?[13] Is that any way to thank Mother Nature?"

http://www.denverlawreview.org/medical-marijuana/

Beer Moth

Anecdotal maybe, but of the crowd I bump into, there are three who have smoked cannabis long-term, and although they are decent types, they are round the friggin bend. It's like talking to alzheimers sufferers with them - something's gone away and I can't see it returning.

As I say, not scientific by any means. However, for further evidence to substantiate my findings, read McD and Pot Head above.

See what I mean? And they're totally unaware of their condition.

William

@ David Raynes

I was intrigued by what you said about Portugal and drug deaths so I went to look at the figures myself and it turns out, not entirely to my surprise, that your selection of statistics is disingenuous at best. As you'll no doubt be aware, the year on year rise in drug mortality from 2004 to 2005 is a blip in a significant longer term downward trend. The admittedly high figure for drug deaths in 2005 was lower than the figure for 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2001.

Further, prior to 1999, drug death figures had been rising more or less steadily since 1987.

Of course it's hard to isolate the effect of Portugal's new legislative regime given the number of external factors that go into the total number of drug deaths (improved hospital care, AIDS treatment, needle swapping programmes etc.) but to take a single year on year increase of a figure that anyway is a pretty poor index of drug prevalence (because of the lag between uptake rates and death rates) and claim that Portugal's drug policy is a failure is frankly either very stupid, or, worse, deliberately misleading.

If you intend to keep posing as a voice of authority on these matters, can I suggest that you read the very comprehensive report by the CATO institute on the success or otherwise of the Portugese approach. You can find it at:
www.cato.org/pubs/wtpapers/greenwald_whitepaper.pdf

Incidentally, the author writes in the executive summary:

"The data show that, judged by virtually every metric, the Portuguese decriminalization frame- work has been a resounding success. Within this success lie self-evident lessons that should guide drug policy debates around the world".

William

One further point. You mentioned that no drug category has decreased (I assume you mean prevalence) since 2001. Again, this is pretty disgraceful misuse of statistical data. The important marker of success or otherwise is whether the rate of increase has slowed compared to previous years and against comparable jurisdictions.

You are very cross-making.

The Truth

@ William,

As Mr Raynes is the head of the NDPA, it is only to be expected that he will be "economical" with any statistics. May I suggest you enter this term into Google: David Raynes Scientology

Raynes will not enter into any discussions, he posts his diatribe, usually containing ad-hominems and then disappears.

William

@ The Truth

Wow. I just did as you suggested and it turns out Raynes is pretty high profile. I had no idea! The fact that he's obviously hugely invested in this issue makes his statistical incompetence all the more disturbing. Thanks for the heads up...

And very interesting about the Scientology links....

Steve Rolles 1

First let’s be clear that there are two different things being discussed here. The Observer feature was about Portugal and its 2001 policy of decriminalising personal possession and use of drugs. Costa’s piece, however, was specifically opposed to legalisation (of production and supply), a quite different proposition (even if it obviously requires decrim of use aswell) .
This was rather clumsy of the Observer IMHO – especially as Costa, the UNODC and even the INCB have spoken approvingly of Portugal's policy – and certainly Costa, even in the Observer piece, says we should not be using prison for addicts (or presumably non-addict users) and should prioritise public health, which is essentially what Portugal has done. His piece feels like it was hastily included to add the requisite editorial balance – even though it was not really relevant to what was being discussed.

On Portugal we must tread carefully – nearly ten years have passed since the policy/law change and there is a great deal of data on a lot of different indicators to pore over. It would be easy to do two things – both of which have been seen in this discussion, and in the wider debate over Portugals policy

1. Cherry pick from the data – either positive or negative outcomes – to support a predetermined postion.

2. Use that data to either applaud or condemn decrim – when infact the changes could be related to any number of other political, social, cultural or economic shifts occurring at the same time.

The CATO Greenwauld report is biased in a positive direction, doing both of the above to provide a rather rose tinted picture of Portugal’s drug policy, whilst others, such as Pinto from the Drug Free Portugal organisation do the opposite. We see exactly the same phenomenon with reporting of the Dutch coffee shops which are either a roaring success or catastrophic failure depending on whom you read. The same is also true of the discourse drug harms – the most obvious being cannabis – which is either benign healing herb or psychosis inducing ruin of modern youth, depending on which filters are used when processing the voluminous body of research.

On Portugal - It is, IMHO, unfortunate that the CATO report has received such prominenc e as it is easily criticised and thus dismissed (by Pinto, and the ONDCP for example) – presenting a baby/ bathwater scenario, for there is certainly much to commend in what Portugal has done (lessons to learn on how to do better too).

It is therefore useful to point to a new peer reviewed study published recently in the British Journal of Criminology here: http://bit.ly/bSLPNT (unfortunately abstract only) 'What Can We Learn From The Portuguese Decriminalization of Illicit Drugs?' by Caitlin Hughes and Alex Stevens.

This piece does not cherry pick (either way), looking at both positive and negative developments in the regional context. concluding that since 2001:

“In the Portuguese case, the statistical indicators and key informant interviews that we have reviewed suggest that, since decriminalisation in July 2001, the following changes have occurred:
• Small increases in reported illicit drug use amongst adults.
• Reduced illicit drug use among problematic drug users and adolescents, at least since 2003.
• Reduced burden of drug offenders on the criminal justice system.
• Increased uptake of drug treatment.
• Reduction in opiate-related deaths and infectious diseases.
• Increases in the amounts of drugs seized by the authorities.
• Reductions in the retail prices of drugs.

By comparing the trends in Portugal and neighbouring Spain and Italy we can say that while some trends clearly reflect regional shifts (e.g. the increase in use amongst adults) and/or the expansion of services throughout Portugal, some effects do appear to be specific to Portugal. Indeed the reduction in problematic drug users and reduction in burden of drug offenders on the criminal justice system were in direct contrast to those trends observed in neighbouring Spain and Italy. Moreover, there are no signs of mass expansion of the drug market in Portugal. This is in contrast with apparent market expansions in neighbouring Spain.”

The paper is written by two respected academics and also provides all the relevant data in graphical form – 2 years more up to date than the CATO report. The CATO and Pinto reports would never have got through a peer review process for the reasons given above.

Crucially,Hughes/Stevens do not attribute the successes or failings in Portugal to the decrim specifically – noting that the shift in emphasis towards a public health approach, including redirection of some criminal justice savings into PH interventions is as likely to be responsible for developments.

I don’t have the energy to unpick Costas piecein detail, but to say that he horribly misrepresents the reform position (check Transform’s Blueprint here: http://bit.ly/5QhrD if you want to know what legal regulation of drug mkts actually means – its not ‘free drugs’) . If you ignore those straw men, much of what he says is fairly reasonable (health, human rights, regulation etc) Search the Transform blog for Costa if you want to read more detailed critique, as this was very much cut and paste from previous comments.

Finally – The personal comments re David Raynes are unwarranted, he is entitled to his view as much as anyone, there is nothing sinister about the NDPA (they are just misunderstand the reform arguments), and he is not a Scientologist. Likewise David – your attempts to undermine reformers with the rather childish ‘user-advocate’ dig you so regularly deploy these days is entirely misplaced. Not only, as you well know, do the advocates of reform come from all walks of life (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition for example – 13,000 former and serving criminal justice professionals, not to mention the politicians, academics, religious leaders, parents, doctors, lawyers etc, etc), but there is something particularly distasteful about using drug use as an ad hom. I’ve had a drink with you more than once. Please stick to the arguments. You’ll still lose but at least with dignity intact.

Darryl Bickler

This is a great point: "The decision to prohibit the consumption of some drugs while permitting the use of others is almost entirely arbitrary and owes little to any credible risk analysis." I think this is the elephant in the room and highlights what is a monumental inequality of treatment between persons. Whislt the actual use of classified drugs is not illegal as this comment suggests (rather it is the possession, trade etc of these drugs that is illegal), it is vital to point out that it is users who are treated arbitrarily before the law (this being in conflict with what the law sets out to achieve).

I do understand why people get upset about David Rayne's agenda - it would be nice to avoid all personal attacks of course, but this is a very emotive subject. It's not really about comparing one policy with another - it is about a willingness on his part to countenance a legal system that persecutes some people who use some drugs for no reason at all. The result is that lives are lost or destroyed around the world, liberty is entirely side-lined and billions of pounds wasted and corruption allowed to run rife. People wouldn't be able to get away with saying the slavery is a good thing and the world needs to use black people as property, or to persecute gays - but for some reason it's all jolly good sport to engage in these never ending cyclical arguments about these vile policies that see people hang for cannabis in some countries, and even medical patients get their doors booted in at 5am and their lives ruined for a few plants in London. I find it hard to be nice to anyone who would perpetuate this evil.

The sooner we liberate mankind from the grip of this madness which is basically nothing more than the barbarism of government drug dealing protection rackets for A&T and big pharma the better. In my view the focus must be on breaking out of these tedious arguments and to insist that we demand equal treatment of persons and identify exactly where the unfairness arises. At the end of the day, it is about people and their minds, not countries, and not even about drugs - it's about freedom to exist in a peaceful way having the self-determination to moderate one's internal chemistry. Let's not fall into the trap of de-personalising the debate to be about mere objects, it is a war on people that we demand be stopped.

William

@ Steve Rolles

Very interesting comment - many thanks. And you're quite right of course that David Raynes is perfectly entitled to his opinion. I did get rather carried away earlier I suppose...

I do think that the way he picked his figures was particularly misleading though, which is a pity really. There can't be many areas of public policy where the arguments for reform (of whatever sort) are more compelling, and I hate to see the case sabotaged by dodgy numbers...