Monthly Archives: March 2017

17 Mar 2017

FOR more than 100 years the United States has looked to prohibition to curtail the use of drugs.

Proponents argue that by making substances like marijuana, cocaine and heroin illegal, government can significantly reduce drug-related crime, prevent addiction and stop the spread of drug-related disease.

The results have been less than impressive. In fact, Michael Botticelli, the director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the War on Drugs has consisted of failed policies and failed practices.

Among alternative policies proposed to better achieve the stated goals are decriminalization of drugs relaxed enforcement and penalties for drug offenses and outright legalization of all drugs.

Yes, all of them.

These options may sound counterproductive, but the data tell a different story. In 2001 Portugal shocked the world and voted to decriminalize all drugs in response to a growing heroin problem.

Things like drug trafficking remain illegal, but drug users are viewed as ill rather than criminal. Instead of immediate arrest and incarceration, people caught with less than a 10-day supply of hard drugs are taken before a special court of legal experts, psychologists and social workers. The goal is a health-focused solution to drug use, with an occasional small fine or community service.

Fifteen years later plentiful data tell a drastically different story from what many predicted. Drug use among 15- to 24-year-olds has decreased dramatically and drug-induced deaths dropped from 80 in 2001 to 16 in 2012. Before 2001 Portugal confined around 100,000 drug users. Within the first 10 years of the policys adoption, this number halved. Today Portugal boasts one of the lowest drug-usage rates in all of Europe.

People are leaving the drug market and seeking treatment. The number of individuals registered in rehab has risen from 6,000 in 1999 to more than 24,000 in 2008. The number of heroin users who inject the drug has decreased from 45 percent to 17 percent. Injection rates are particularly important when discussing drug-related disease. Drug addicts now account for only 20 percent of HIV cases in the country, a significant improvement from the previous 56 percent.

These results can be explained with basic economics. As people get help for their drug use, the number of users that is, the demand for drugs falls. When the demand falls, drug suppliers find that their once-lucrative enterprise no longer bears fruit. So they exit the market.

This would explain why a 2010 study in the British Journal of Criminology found that after decriminalization Portugal saw a significant reduction in the imprisonment of alleged drug dealers, from 14,000 in 2000 to 5,000 in 2010. In fact, the proportion of people in jail for crimes committed while under the influence of drugs or to feed a drug habit fell from 41 percent in 1999 to 21 percent in 2008.

By redirecting resources previously allocated to arresting and jailing drug users, Portugal has not only curbed its drug problem but has created a healthier society. When asked what the global community should take away from Portugals policy, Alex Steven, president of the International Society of the Study of Drug Policy, said, The main lesson to learn (is that) decriminalizing drugs doesnt necessarily lead to disaster, and it does free up resources for more effective responses to drug-related problems.

There is something to learn from treating drug use as a physical and mental illness. Consider the results of the Portuguese policy versus the U.S. approach. While Portugals rates of use, incarceration and illness have all fallen, drug use in the United States has remained relatively unchanged for the past decade. Each year 1.5 million people are arrested on drug-related charges, 80 percent for mere possession. Half of all federal incarcerations are drug-related.

Few would argue that drug use isnt a problem. Without a doubt, drug use presents problems for public health and destroys many lives. But when examining the efficacy of drug policies, the U.S. model is nothing short of a complete failure. Its time to look at alternatives. As the Portuguese case illustrates, so-called radical policies may be perfectly reasonable.

Abigail R. Hall is a research fellow at the Independent Institute and an assistant professor of economics at the University of Tampa. She received her Ph.D. from George Mason University.

Kaila Preston is a student majoring in entrepreneurship at the University of Tampa.

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Marianas Variety - OPINION: Portugal won the war on drugs by ... - Marianas Variety

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The attorney general appears poised to revive the country's costliest policy failure.

In a brief address delivered to law enforcement personnel in Richmond, Virginia on Wednesday, Attorney General and maybe-perjurer Jeff Sessions spent most of his allotted time discussing the same talking points he's been recycling since his appointment: Police brutality is a social media-driven myth; America is a hellish, crime-ridden, post-apocalyptic wasteland; and scary, scary drugs will come into your home and kill you in your sleep unless you pray to your bedside portrait of Ronald Reagan.

This version of his stump speech, though, contained some new, alarming hints about his agency's drug enforcement priorities. Sessions made clear that he would direct the Department of Justice to take on the burgeoning, deadly epidemic of heroin and opioid use. After that, though, things quickly went off the rails:

I realize this may be an unfashionable belief in a time of growing tolerance of drug use, but too many lives are at stake to worry about being fashionable. I reject the idea that America will be a better place if marijuana is sold in every corner store. And I am astonished to hear people suggest that we can solve our heroin crisis by legalizing marijuanaso people can trade one life-wrecking dependency for another thats only slightly less awful. Our nation needs to say clearly once again that using drugs will destroy your life.

This is a breathtaking false equivalence. Treating marijuana usage and heroin addiction as the same isn't "unfashionable"it willfully ignores basic medical and scientific research. (Hmmm, where have we heard that before.) Marijuana cannot cause a fatal overdose. To the extent that it leads to addiction, the risk is low, and the symptoms are nothing like those that accompany the crippling, "life-wrecking" condition of heroin dependence. Most maddeningly, the consensus among experts is that the public health risks of marijuana use pale in comparison to those posed by alcohol and tobacco, both of which are substances that you can already go buy from the corner store, probably in the time it takes you to read this post.

In short, there isn't really a good policy argument for initiating this type of hysterical, "Reefer Madness"-esque crackdown on marijuana, unlessand I'm just spitballing hereyou're less interested in "fighting drugs" and more interested in the political and social implications that taking up this fight might entail. President Nixon declared the first War on Drugs in large part to disrupt the organizing activities of his political enemiesAfrican-Americans and, at the time, the anti-war left. His efforts, of course, led to such a massive spike in the minority incarceration rate that the ACLU compared it to mid-century Jim Crow laws in the South. (You know, the same laws Jeff Sessions grew up with in Hybart, Alabama.) The draconian, decades-long War on Drugs is a trillion-dollar failureassuming that your goal is actually stopping drug use, and not any of that other stuff.

This is what happens when law enforcement policy gets entrusted to a bigoted septuagenarian who learned everything he knows about drugs from D.A.R.E. and that very special episode of Saved By The Bell, and does not care to educate himself any further. Jeff Sessions is itching to revive a policy initiative that has succeeded at nothing except disenfranchising and incarcerating low-income Americans and people of color, and if he has to rely on a outrageous falsehood to justify that decision, so be it.

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Jeff Sessions Just Kicked Off the Next War on Drugs - GQ Magazine

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March 15, 2017, 5:18 PM EDT

Rodrigo Dutertes deadly war on drugs has resumed. TheU.S., the European Union and the United Nations have all condemned the Philippine presidents crackdown on suspected dealers and users, serving only to rile the expletive-prone lawyer-turned-politician. The reaction at home so far appears less critical, even supportive, while a senator who led a backlash has ended up in jail. Duterte suspended anti-drug operations in January, but the hiatus is over and the death toll is rising again.

More than 7,000, according to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. The government says thats an exaggeration, with police reporting about 2,500 fatalities in the seven months through Jan. 30. That was the date when Duterte removed policefrom the operations afterrogue officers were implicated in the murder of a South Korean businessman. Of some 4,700 other murders that human rights groups labeled extra-judicial killings (meaning they were committed by vigilante groups), police say less than a third were drugs-linked. Either way, Duterte has brought about more loss of life than former president Ferdinand Marcos during his eight years of martial rule and Thailand during its war on drugs that began in 2003.

Dealer, users, drug lords -- anyone connected to the illegal trade. Duterte estimates there are as many as 4 million drug addicts in the Southeast Asian nation of about 100 million people. The Dangerous Drugs Board puts the tally at 1.8 million, with crystal meth -- known as shabu -- the No. 1 scourge for Duterte.As part of the campaign, police say they have made 7 million home visits to persuade suspects to mend their ways.

They support the campaign more than the methods. Eight out of 10 Filipinos polled in December were satisfied with Dutertes anti-narcotics drive, although that was before a Senate investigation brought to light police abuses. On the other hand, 78 percent of Filipinos worry that they or someone they know may die in extra-judicial operations. Nine out of 10 Filipinos think drug suspects should be caught alive.

The 71-year-oldhas termed narcotic use a pandemic and promises to pardon police officers who are convicted of killing drug suspects in self-defense. He accuses critics of valuing the lives of criminals over the good of society.Debunking allegations that he is engineering a human rights calamity, Duterte has said: When you kill criminals, that is not a crime against humanity. The criminals have no humanity, God damn it.

A national police chief said the renewed campaign -- called "Project Double Barrel, Reloaded -- will be less bloody, if not bloodless.At the same time, the military has said it will act as a force provider to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency. Barely a week after the campaign resumed March 7, police said law enforcers had killed 27 drug suspects in 679 operations.

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Amnesty International says the poor have been targeted disproportionately, while Human Rights Watch has appealed to the UN to investigate. Then theres Leila de Lima, the senator whos now in jail. She was indicted for drug trafficking in February and accused of allowing illegal drugs to flourish inside the national jail while serving as justice secretary. De Lima says the charges are lies and her arrest was politically motivated. The lawmaker had led a Senate probe into alleged vigilante killings by death squads in Davao City from the 1980s. Duterte, who was Davao mayor for more than two decades from 1988, says testimonylinking him to the death squads was a fabrication.

Duterte campaigned to make fighting crime a cornerstone of his government, vowing to stamp out illegal drugs within six months. He now says he may spend the rest of his presidential term on the job because the situation is worse than he had thought.A former Colombia president has warned Duterte that throwing soldiers and police at the drug problem will only make it worse. Thailands experience of using force also does not bode well, but Duterte is unbowed. I have six years to do it and I will kill you, he said.

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Bodies Pile Up in Duterte's Deadly War on Drugs: QuickTake Q&A - Bloomberg

The number of people sentenced for federal marijuana-related crimes dropped for the fifth year in a row, according to data released this week by the U.S. Sentencing Commission.

A total of 3,534 offenders received sentences for federal marijuana crimes in 2016. The overwhelming majority of these cases 3,398 of them involved trafficking marijuana. Another 122 individuals received federal sentences for simple possession of marijuana, although some of these offenders may have pleaded down from a more serious offense.

The commission's statistics show thatmore than 97 percent of people charged with a federal crime plead guilty, rather than go to trial.

Colorado and Washington became the first states to legalize recreational marijuana in 2012. The data show a sharp drop in the number of federal marijuana sentences the following year, down from 6,992 to 4,942.

The sale and use of marijuana for any purpose, recreational, medical or otherwise, remains a crime at the federal level even in states where it's legal. But in 2013 the Justice Department issued guidance givingfederal prosecutors leeway to ignore certain marijuana offenses, provided such behavior was otherwise in compliance with an applicable state law.

These federal numbers don't include sentencing under state and local law, where the overwhelming majority of drug enforcement takes place. In 2015, for instance,more than a half-million people were arrested by state or local authorities for simple marijuana possession, according to FBI statistics. By contrast, only about 3,500 people received federal sentences for marijuana crimes of any sort that year.

Federal sentences for heroin have more than doubled over the past 10 years, according to the USSC, in part reflecting the current opioid epidemic. While 1,382 people received federal heroin sentences in 2007, over 2,800 were sentenced for heroin crimes last year.

But the overall number of federal heroin sentences is still low relative to most other drugs. That's because heroin is a lot easier to smuggle: On a per-gram basis, heroin is about 26 times more valuable than marijuana, according to federal statistics from 2012. That means that small, easy to conceal heroin shipments can still be highly lucrative. (According to some estimates, the entirety of heroin consumed in a year in the United States could fit within one or two standard shipping containers.)

Heroin is a lot harder to detect, seize and charge people with than a cheaper, bulkier product like marijuana, but it's also more dangerous.About13,000 people overdose on heroineach year, while zero overdose on marijuana.

Much of what we see in the chart above is a function of the decisions made by individual U.S. attorneys. President Trump recently fired all the remaining holdovers from the Obama administration, meaning that a new batch of prosecutors who may have different ideas about what marijuana sentences have to do with the pursuit of justice will soon be taking their place.

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Here's the latest data on the federal war on drugs - Washington Post - Washington Post

* Statement of the International Indigenous Peoples Movement for Self Determination and Liberation

Would the current approach of the Duterte adminstration on the drug problem bring the desired aim of controlling the spread of addiction? With more than six thousand deaths, a million and a half person that voluntarily surrendered, more five million house visits, thousands of arrest and huge volume of shabu confiscation is it safe to say that its headed for something?

The failure of Colombian and American war on drugs should be taken seriously. Since the ascendancy of Richard Nixon as President of USA the war on drugs took a dramatic turn similar to the Colombian efforts. Both government spent billions of dollars on making record arrests and detention, raids, assassinations and even punishing big names. Last year US the Special Forces were involved in capturing El Chapo in Mexico; while the Colombian government has Pablo Escobar to its credit. And yet the problem not just persisted but got worse. In both countries there is a continuing trend of substance abuse and incarcerations.

Far from convincing, our current statistics should be viewed more as distress signals to a worsening catastrophe rather than treated as positive indicators.

The same with the old ways of facing the menace, Oplan Tokhang and Double Barrel doesnt live up to its expectation of getting the big shot, those behind the shadow of power and dont offer a credible challenge to the whole narco-politiical body. There is a list of influential and powerful individual from the public and business sphere, including foreign nationals that are identified as being involved in drugs, but up to now we have yet to see the full extent to which the government would go to bring them to justice.

It is established fact that illegal drug trade would not prosper without the nods of the bosses in authority and their cooperation. From just over a million addicts in the early 2000s the number soared to 5 million in just fifteen years. Hundreds of thousands are into peddling, security and other logistical support for drug trade. And a multi-billion business comparable to the biggest investments in the country. It is a grand private-public partnership scheme with plain criminal intent almost in the same level as its legal counterpart.

Only when a Korean that was murdered on Camp Crame grounds did the administration made an insincere suspension and started investigating those implicated in the case and identified internal loopholes. Another four hundred police were presented as rouge cops after the incident. Although most of them faced minor administrative charges and redeployed to Basilan. Criminals in uniform could thrive more in terror affected areas.

Internal cleansing of the whole bureaucracy and the armed forces should have been the first order before launching a very delicate and massive campaign. But so little is being done to address the rampant corruption within the government and the collusion of not a few officials with syndicates.

And this deepseated reluctance is one of key factor why all the fast efforts failed to really address the drug problem.

Does this mean that the administration is just prioritizing first the lower class before he goes up guns loaded the social ladder? And why did they planned it and executed that way?

Its this defective strategy and poor implementation that should concern us all. The modus operandi is to take down as many cheap druggies the victims that needed to be saved they were once called in the hope that there insignificance would not cause a fuss. Until it comes to a time, determined by public perception and government evaluation, that It would be announced the Philippines is drug free and we all get the happy ending that we are promised of.

The shroud of secrecy that envelopes the process of determining a target should break everyones silence. If one is really involved in drugs doesnt the person deserve due process and presented to a proper court like the case of Sen.Leila De Lima, the self-proclaimed political prisoner who gets all the media attention absent to her real counterparts. Thats just total denial of many fundamental human rights and subversion of the judicial process.

The rampant killings is appalling and a cause of grave concern especially for the welfare of the marginalized, of Indigenous Peoples because it brings into mind the policies of the past-regimes of eliminating opposition beyond legal parameters. As Indigenous Peoples are very vulnerable to state forces attacks and vilification it is no surprise that the drug war could be used by the ruling elite as a pretext for more abuse and violence like the case of the four Bulacan farmers being implicated with drug trading last December 2016.

Most of the victims in the US are disenfranchised, poor black Americans and Spanish migrants and descendants mostly living in the ghettos while in Colombia they were mostly urban poor and peasant migrants coming from the remote villages. A chilling demonstration of marginalization and discrimination.

And the Philippine experience is no different. A simple review of the news and victims profiles will easily show the lethal correlation. To be poor, uneducated and jobless are red flags for the authority and that add to the growing insecurity most of the people feel.

But being poor is not a threat itself. Majority of the lower class strive hard to earn a decent living. What is seriously lacking is the opportunity to encompass all the jobless and underprivileged. And with the failure of the current economic system and the urgency to survive a small number of our countrymen turn to criminal jobs.

In the end, the process of drug proliferation will not stop since the root causes are never sufficiently addressed: the continuous internal power struggle within the government institution, the rehabilitation of patient-victims, the educational and cultural requirements, the trial and punishment of drug elites and the basic socio-economic aspects of the whole process.

Should we wait more? is a very limited Machiavellian question: What are the factors for success is a more critical alternative.

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STATEMENT| Who is winning in the war on drugs? - Davao Today

Sandy M. Isanti County resident

Theres an epidemic of ignorance in this country that needs to be addressed.

While lawmakers and the CDC are taking a blanket approach (with suspicious motives) to what they are calling an epidemic of opioid abuse, no one seems to be talking about the forgotten victims of this war on prescription pain medication.

Im referring to the countless people that the government has suddenly decided do not deserve relief from their pain: chronic pain sufferers. Suddenly, in many cases, because chronic pain patients are going to see their doctors or specialists expecting a refill of the medication they have come to rely on and being told as they sit in front of their provider that the government has banned them from prescribing anymore opioids to treat their chronic pain.

These are the patients who have been taking their medication responsibly, subjecting themselves to all of the obstacles and humiliation that have been set up for people using opioid drug therapy for their pain. In many instances, these patients are not being given effective alternatives to treat their pain or even being monitored to see if they have any adverse effects from the opioid withdrawal. The ignorance and incompetence surrounding this situation is mind-boggling.

Im speaking from over 20 years of experience suffering chronic, debilitating pain, and the vast network of people in pain I have come in contact with over that time. Our circumstances may vary, but our stories are eerily similar- and these are the stories the lawmakers and media for the most part fail to talk about.

Victims of chronic pain who responsibly use opioids to control their pain are not addicts; on the contrary, many have been given back their livelihood due to the effectiveness of these drugs to control pain. Many have found that the relief of pain the opiates provide enables them to work again, do their own shopping, drive more comfortably and reactively, and participate in social activities. Impairment from the pain they were experiencing was much more distracting than the effects of the pain-relieving drug. A significant number of people experience more than just pain relief on the opioid therapy, because effective pain relief in turn leads to better sleep and healthier food consumption, less depression and better organization and creativity.

For some, the symptoms of brain-fog dramatically improve because we are no longer focused on fighting excruciating pain. With the opioid treatment I regained my memory, concentration, and was able to write and work again as well as take part in activities outside my home. I was also able to effectively participate in physical therapy and guided imagery to help keep my dose of the medication at a minimum. Without it, I fear the loss of all of that, and a life doomed to be lived from my sofa once more. Taking opioids to relieve pain in order to be productive and to maintain relationships is vastly different from being addicted, which limits a persons ability to contribute to society.

I recognize that opioid treatment for pain is far from being a perfect solution, as it never completely takes the pain away, but for many of us it does mean the difference between spending the day in bed and being able to get up and make a meal and tend to our families. And now the government is taking that away from us without giving us effective alternatives. In the majority of cases of chronic pain sufferers there is no good reason to stop opioid pain medication other than because of government interference. Most of these patients have been responsible users and are not contributing to the so-called epidemic of over use of drugs in our society.

This is in no way meant to minimize the horrible consequences of opioid abuse and overdose and the loss of lives that have taken place, but there is another side of the story that must be considered. Careful research into the motives behind this war on drugs will reveal that agencies blocked the input of chronic pain patients and their doctors from contributing their experiences before setting up the new guidelines for opioid prescribing. A look at who may be profiting from these new guidelines will reveal some startling information. Reliable predictions are being made that these new restrictions on opioid drugs will serve to increase illegal drug use as well as leading to an epidemic of suicide by chronic pain patients no longer able to find relief. Self-medicating instead of being monitored by a physician is another danger these patients may face.

There are many relevant articles that can be accessed online, including these from the Pain News Network- Its Time for Pain Patients to Speak Up, and DEA Cutting Opioid Supply in 2017. Also check out Fighting Back: The War against Chronic Pain Sufferers, Dr. Lynn Websters book, The Painful Truth, and For some chronic pain patients, without opioids, life would be torture by Stat News.

I urge people to look more deeply into this issue and speak up for the millions that are being overlooked and disregarded who deserve better. The unfortunate stigma of being a chronic pain patient searching for relief extends to doctors, pharmacists, lawmakers, the media and even family members. This is an impossible battle for victims of pain to fight unaided.

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Forgotten victims of the 'War on Drugs' | - Isanti County News - Isanti County News