Monthly Archives: March 2021

This article by Haley Giuliano was originally published onNisonCo, and appears here with permission.

NisonCo takes pride in supporting causes that better the lives of marginalized and persecuted people in our nation. This includes standing up for the rights of minority communities and gaining a better understanding of the history that has created inequitable situations for them. February is Black History Month and another chance to review the past in the hopes of understanding and changing the present. In that pursuit, this article seeks to explore how the War on Drugs molded black culture and reinforced structural racism in American culture.

The War on Drugs played a pivotal role in the history of cannabis and continues to impact society today. The government initiative, presented under the guise of creating a safer America for all, led to disproportionate incarceration rates and further strengthened the questionable underpinnings of an already-racist nation. Policing primarily minority communities while pretending not to do so reinforced the structural racism at the heart of political campaigns for the time. It also led to decades of continued unjust imprisonment for people of color. The War on Drugs played a huge part in the embedding of structural racism in the United States today.

From theOpium Exclusion Actin 1909 to theMarihuana Tax Act of 1937, regulations on drugs became all the more standard with the procession of time. In 1970, theControlled Substances Actsigned into law by Richard Nixon sought to classify drugs according to their addictive nature and medical benefits by separating them into schedules. This scheduling is still used today, although some drugs have changed classifications as science continues to explore various substances medical benefits.

In June of 1971, the drug climate changed when Nixon announced theWar on Drugs, declaring substance abuse as public enemy number one. Illegal drug use would now label someone a criminal and result in extensive prison time. Nixon even went on to create one of todays best-known governmental agencies, theDrug Enforcement Administration, as part of his continued crusade on drugs, drug sellers, and users.

In a perfect world, having a government fight toward the eradication of illegal acts in the hopes of creating safer lives for all Americans sounds virtuous. However, this was not the intent of Nixon and the United States government, despite their political advertisements. John Ehrlichman, President Nixons domestic policy chief, gave an interview in 1994 which explained the true motives behind the War on Drugs. Ehrlichmanstatedthat the government, couldnt make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin[,] and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities.

And the War on Drugs did just that. Cannabis became stigmatized despite its previously common usage, and heroin was policed largely only in minority communities. Racism was still rampant, and now law enforcement agencies had even more cause to arrest minorities. Black neighborhoods were devoured by drug busts, and more and morepeople of color entered the correctional system. In 1986, years after Nixon declared his War on Drugs, people of color were still being unjustly but legally persecuted through the1986 Anti-Drug Abuse Act, which allocatedlonger prison sentencesfor offenses involving the same amount of crack cocaine (used more often by black Americans) as powder cocaine (used more often by white Americans).

The disproportionate amount of black to white convictions wasnt the only outcome of the War on Drugs, though. It also strengthened the roots that structural racism already had in America. Imprisoning people of color at such an alarming rate left a generation without parents and the guidance all children need. It brought individuals with no previous criminal background into the realm of crime, whichexpertssay is a cycle that is hard to escape. It also created a perception of people of color as delinquents simply because their faces were the ones more often apprehended, despite their lauded white counterparts committing the same crimes.

Of course, structural racism goes far beyond the War on Drugs and its legal implications. Structural racism is an infestation in the United States that goes back to the days of slavery and through to present-day prejudices. But Nixons rampage against minority communities through his substance abuse agenda surely left a mark on colored communities that is hard to escape and could have been avoided. The War on Drugs was just one of the many unethical and biased legislations of the past century. It is the responsibility of the people to continue fighting its racist ramifications and remember that, though created equal, people of color are seldom treated as such.

Looking forward as we have a chance to build, shape and form the new cannabis industry its important to remember the effects of lead us here so we may grow and facilitate a representative industry. NisonCo providespro bono cannabis seo and public relations servicesto advocacy groups and individuals engaged in activism, as well as companies that are advancing socially responsible and ethical practices in innovative, impactful, and systemic ways. In this way and many others, we seek to be not just a company that operates for profit, but a company that cares. Happy Black History Month, and remember that every month is a chance to celebrate culture and acceptance.

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How The War On Drugs Reinforced Structural Racism - Benzinga

Daniel Comeaux arrived at work Monday to lead the Drug Enforcement Administrations Houston office. It is familiar territory for the 51-year-old lawman.

His first stint as a cop was here, in the Houston Police Department, where he spent years as a street level narcotics investigator chasing dealers across the city. He also spent his first days as a DEA agent here before threats from a corrupt drug-dealing Houston police officer hed investigated and arrested prompted Comeauxs bosses to transfer him to San Francisco.

When Comeaux was sworn in as a Houston police officer in 1992, crack cocaine was the drug of choice and more than 400 Houstonians died that year in crimes of violence.

Three decades later, the nations war on drugs has come under increasing scrutiny, as states across the U.S. have taken more permissive stances on medical and recreational drug use.

In Houston, however, homicides are back on the rise, with more than 400 in 2020. Instead of crack, federal agents are now seizing fentanyl and methamphetamines.

As the DEAs Special Agent-in-Charge, Comeaux oversees 700 agents working in 12 offices across south, central and east Texas, targeting transnational criminal organizations, gangs, counterfeit pills and other dangerous drugs.

Comeaux remains unwavering in his mission.

We have to continue to fight, Comeaux said, during a recent interview in the DEAs Houston Field Office on the West Loop. We have to try to stay up with the times and be more aggressive.

A baseball fanatic, Comeaux moved to San Marcos in 1990 to play baseball at Texas State University then known as Southwest Texas State University.

Hed dreamed of playing professional baseball, but when an injury sidelined him, a classmates father a Houston police officer asked him what he planned on doing for his career.

Be like you, a cop, Comeaux joked. The next week, the sergeant dropped an application into his lap.

I dont think so, he remembers thinking.

Comeaux grew up on New Orleans east side, in the seventh and ninth wards neighborhoods where kids didnt trust or rely on police. Gradually, however, he became more intrigued, and eventually signed up and attended HPDs training academy. After being sworn in 1992, he worked as a patrol officer on the citys east side and in south central for about a year, before the department announced it was hiring dozens of new narcotics officers.

Still a green patrol officer, Comeaux applied anyway. When he showed up for an interview, one captain asked him why he was there he didnt have enough time on.

I just put my name in, he said. You guys gave me a call, he told them.

Despite his inexperience, a sergeant phoned him soon after that interview. He still remembers the call.

They made me take you, the sergeant said. Report Monday to South Central narcotics.

The animosity didnt end there.

He took a lot of flak, said Darrin Bush, Comeauxs old HPD partner. A lot of guys resented the fact that he got there so quick.

For the next several years, the pair worked on street level enforcement teams attempting to stem drug trafficking across the city.

It was a perfect, perfect scenario, Comeaux said. You have a 22-23 year old black male, from New Orleans which Houston, has always been a source city for New Orleans so my whole story was Im down here to buy dope to bring back to New Orleans.

Comeaux was known for a relentless competitive drive There was always something to compete about, Bush said and his numerous side hustles. After he read a story about how much dentists made, he talked about wanting to go to dentistry school. Though he never was able to play professionally, he coached Little League and sometimes spoke of wanting to run a baseball clinic. And there was an ill-fated attempt to start a travel agency.

He always had different irons in the fire, Bush said.

The policework, meanwhile, was frequently dangerous. As the two sat outside an apartment complex on one stakeout, they saw a car pull up alongside them. One of the people in the other car looked over, and asked them what they were looking at.

I kind of just shook my head, and I wasnt gonna say anything, Comeaux recalled. He was about to pull out of the parking lot when he heard the driver tell a passenger in the car to blast that fool.

My eyes got big. I see the trunk pop open. And it was like a movie. The guy goes in the back and gets a shotgun. And he points the shotgun at me .. And at this point, Im like, Yo, this guys going to jail. He doesnt know who hes messing with. So I get out the car. And as I get out the car, the shotgun, boom, they shoot with a shotgun. And I hit the ground.

The gunmen drove off, and then barricaded themselves in a nearby apartment. Neither Comeaux nor Bush were hit. They called SWAT and posted up outside the apartment. When SWAT burst into the apartment, they discovered the men had broken a hole through the ceiling, crawled across the ceilings of several apartments, then entered another apartment four doors down to escape.

But instead of fleeing, the men wandered back to the crowd to watch the cops at work and thats where Comeaux and Bush spotted the suspects and arrested them.

In 1997, Comeaux decided to join the DEA. The reason was simple: The money was better. But a recruiter told him hed have to get a degree. He transferred to the University of Houston, finished the degree hed started at Southwest Texas State University, and enrolled in the DEAs training academy in August of that year.

After he graduated, he returned to Houston only to have to pack his bags once again, after informants contacted his bosses with a tip. A Houston police officer Comeaux had investigated and arrested for drug trafficking shortly before making the jump to the DEA was threatening his life. Comeaux would have to leave town, they said. There was a spot in the San Francisco office. He had to leave immediately.

Comeaux returned to Houston in 2000, before transferring to an assignment in Arizona. He steadily rose through the ranks, with other assignments in Mississippi, Washington D.C., New Orleans, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

Across the country, many critics argue that the war on drugs has caused a wave of incarceration which has disproportionately hit African-American men and led to needless crime and violence.

Comeaux sees it differently. Some 81,000 people died of overdoses between May 2019 through May of 2020, he argues. Fatal overdoses fueled by synthetic opioids rose 39 percent in that time period, while meth overdoses rose 35 percent during that time. Seizures of both drugs are up sharply as well. In Houston, DEA agents seized more than 300 kilograms of fentanyl in 2020 six times as much as the year before. Agents seized some 9,800 kilos of meth twice as much as in 2019. The products are pushed by violent cartels like the Jalisco Cartel New Generation and consumed by eager American buyers.

Its hitting everybody, Comeaux said.

The drugs are mass produced in Mexico, easily transported across the border. And the product is no longer getting sold on the corners, as sellers have shifted to Craigslist or OfferUp or other online venues.

If we didnt do drug enforcement, I think youd have 10 times the violence that you see now, he said. If we werent taking these criminals off the streets, it would be even more violence.

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The war on drugs took him across the country. Now, he's back home to lead the DEA's Houston office. - Houston Chronicle

There isnt much in the way of dignity for the dead in Navotas Public Cemetery.

Remains are stacked in cinder-block holes five levels high. Their openings are cemented shut and painted in blue, yellow or pink pastels. Those whose families cant afford a plaque have their names scrawled in black ink. On days when the humidity and breeze conspire, the stench of decomposing bodies hangs over grounds strewn with trash and uncollected bones.

Such is death for the poor and the accused in an unforgiving land. Yet one more humiliation awaits scores of those buried at the cemetery along Manila Bay. In a few months, the first wave of victims of Philippine President Rodrigo Dutertes war on drugs will be exhumed and left for loved ones to relocate.

July marks the fifth anniversary of the bloody campaign in which thousands of mostly urban poor were killed in nightly sweeps by authorities and vigilantes. The raids in alleys and homes claimed the guilty and the innocent. So many of those gunned down are believed to be interred at Navotas that the site has been dubbed Tokhang Village, after the name given to the campaign, Knock and plead.

Like many burial sites in Manila, remains can be interred at Navotas only for a maximum of five years because of chronic overcrowding. After that, its up to families to pay for a permanent burial plot or a bone crypt. That was a burden few could afford the average monthly salary in the Philippines is about $300 even before the COVID-19 pandemic pushed millions more into poverty.

Many of those felled in the drug war are expected to meet the same ending as generations of impoverished Filipinos before: stuffed in rice sacks and stored in charnel houses or dumped in piles, mixed with rubble and gravel on the cemetery floor.

It is only the poor who have this problem because the rich have spaces in private cemeteries and they rest there forever, said Danny Pilario, a priest who founded an organization to care for widows and orphans left behind by the drug war. The poor have to be evicted from their abodes, not only in life but also in death. They are homeless forever.

With the deadline approaching, family members are frantically assessing their finances in hopes of avoiding a similar fate for their husbands, sons, cousins and uncles.

It is a cruel math shared by many who come to Navotas, a place of few flowers, no repose and whispered words to saints. A 28-year-old woman whose father and brother were fatally shot on the same day in the summer of 2016 arrived on a recent afternoon.

She wiped away tears and sweat in the glare of a beating sun. She bowed her head and prayed, placing candles before the tombs.

She had come to see if a gravedigger had marked the site with an X, the common way families are alerted that exhumation is imminent. Ten years ago, she was stunned to discover a tomb belonging to another brother, this one killed in a gang fight, had been smashed open and his remains removed. She did not know then to look for an X. She didnt want to make that mistake again.

On this day, there was no marking, but she was told that it wouldnt be long before the remains of her father and her brother would be removed. Not only was their lease expiring, but the land she stood on also would soon make way for a building development.

The woman was one of 15 family members of victims of extrajudicial killings who spoke to The Times for this report. Like most of them, she recounted her ordeal on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from the police.

Family members grieve over the death of a suspected drug dealer in 2016.

(Linus Guardian Escandor II / For The Times)

Her father, 53, and brother, 27, were drug dealers in their neighborhood when they were killed the elder by police in a raid and the younger by unknown gunmen. The two sold shabu, a cheap methamphetamine known as the poor mans cocaine that is ubiquitous in the Philippines, a major international transit hub for narcotics.

National disgust for that trade propelled Dutertes political ascent and unleashed a wave of extrajudicial killings. As with most drug war fatalities, authorities claimed the womans father had resisted arrest. But the woman said he was asleep when police stormed their house and executed him. Guns were planted at the crime scene to support claims that he fought back. The womans 12-year-old sister witnessed the killing.

The family tumbled into crisis. The womans mother abandoned the family and moved in with another man. The woman not only had to care for her three children, but also four younger siblings and her brothers two children.

To pay for the funeral and tombs, she sold her parents house and the family motorcycle. A former drug dealer, the woman these days lives on church donations and money earned selling tea. Jobs are scarce in Manila, which has been under months of COVID-19-related restrictions, contributing to the worst economic times in the Philippines since the country started publishing national data after World War II.

She needs hundreds of dollars she does not have for a permanent burial site for her father and her brother.

I have to keep trying because Im not sure if we can ever attain justice, she said. But knowing they have a decent resting place in the cemetery gives me peace of mind somehow.

A woman prays near a section of La Loma Cemetery in Manila for unclaimed remains.

(Aie Balagtas See / For The Times)

The systematic execution of thousands of suspected drug abusers and dealers has shaken the country but has not deterred Duterte, whose term ends next year.

Rather than sink the mercurial leaders allure, his often vulgar pledges of street justice only made him more popular to his followers. The impunity of the drug war, which peaked in 2016 and 2017, emboldened Duterte to jail political rivals, silence independent media organizations and violently suppress human rights workers.

Amnesty International said an average of 34 people a day, or about 7,000 in all, were killed by police and vigilantes from July 1, 2016, to Jan. 21, 2017. There are no exact figures as to how many people have been killed since the drug war began. But human rights groups say the total number may be between 20,000 and 40,000.

At least 3,000 killings are under investigation by the Philippine Commission on Human Rights. Last year, Fatou Bensouda, prosecutor for the International Criminal Court at The Hague, said her office may investigate later this year to determine whether crimes against humanity had been committed.

In a move widely viewed as a bid to head off international scrutiny, Philippine Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra acknowledged to the United Nations Human Rights Council in a speech last month that police had failed to follow standard protocols in thousands of drug-related deaths. That includes examining recovered guns, verifying ownership of firearms or conducting ballistic examinations.

Government critics say the remarks were short of an admission that guns found at crime scenes were planted as evidence.

As more proof of official wrongdoing emerges, calls are growing to keep the dead at Navotas and other cemeteries from being taken from their cinder-block graves.

Its enraging that families of drug war victims have to endure this in the middle of a pandemic, said Rubilyn Litao, the coordinator of Rise Up, an ecumenical group that has documented hundreds of drug war cases. They cannot even put food on the table.... Their loved ones should not have been killed in the first place.

With seven children to feed, Rodalyn Adan has no way of paying $67 for her late husbands remains to be exhumed and transferred to a permanent bone crypt, a resting spot that will eventually cost $21 a year to maintain.

Adan, 32, does not have a stable job but wants to keep her husband at Bagbag Cemetery in Quezon City so that her children can visit his tomb regularly. Her husband, Crisanto Abliter, was 32 when he was rounded up by police on Oct. 4, 2016, and never seen alive again.

Our [youngest] child was still a baby when my husband was killed, Adan said. Our baby is 6 years old now and hes always asking why his father refuses to get out of the niche. I tell him that it was because he was cemented inside the tomb.

The improper handling of cases such as Abliters should prompt the government to stop or delay exhumations, said the Commission on Human Rights, an independent constitutional office.

Mandatory disinterment of remains from public cemeteries after five years could potentially hinder current and prospective investigations into extrajudicial killings by complicating access to remains whose deaths are in question, said Jacqueline De Guia, a spokeswoman for the commission.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte gave shoot-to-kill orders against drug dealers.

(Eugene Hoshiko / Associated Press)

Marissa Lazaros 20-year-old son Christopher was shot dead by police after he was mistaken for a drug-addled thief as he was on his way home Aug. 4, 2017, in Bulacan province, north of Manila. A medical examiner told Lazaro that her sons hands were tied when he was killed.

The lease for Christophers tomb will expire next year. She wants him to be reburied in a cemetery near the familys home and a park where he used to play. She traveled thousands of miles and took a job as a domestic helper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, to help pay for it all. But her employer was abusive. She quit her contract and returned home deeper in debt.

Lazaro knows what its like for a body to be forever lost. Her father died when she was 9. She does not know where his remains are.

They were exhumed without her mothers permission. As a child, she often asked her aunts why they never paid respects to him in Manila North Cemetery. They said his body had been turned into vetsin powder, or monosodium glutamate. Traumatized by this joke, Lazaro refused to use MSG in her cooking for years, thinking they were sourced from human bones.

She needs $4,000 to move Christopher to a permanent place. It seems an impossible sum.

My other children tell me: Ma, stop prioritizing the dead. But I cannot allow my son to suffer the same fate as my father, Lazaro said. People killed by the police already died a gruesome death. Cant they not have a decent repose?

She doesnt know if this will happen. But she is signing up to work overseas again.

Special correspondent Balagtas See reported from Manila and Times staff writer Pierson from Singapore.

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Philippines drug war victims land in leased graves that expire - Los Angeles Times

Drug overdoses dramatically rose during the pandemic to make 2020 our deadliest year so far.

Overdoses claimed the lives of81,000 Americansin the 12 months up to May 2020. In San Francisco, for example, fatal overdoses killedthree timesas many people as the coronavirus. The overdose crisis is an epidemic, and we must invest in proven life-saving solutions.

And this crisis is requiring us to bring new thinking to drug policy.

President Joe Bidencommittedto end incarceration for drug use, explaining that no one should be imprisoned for the use of illegal drugs alone.

As a former prosecutor and a public health researcher, we agree with this starting point, having seen that incarcerating people for drug use doesnt make communities safer or healthier.

In lieu of incarceration, Biden has embraced drug courts and other forms of coerced or forced drug treatment to address the mounting crises of overdose and addiction in the United States. Although we agree with the presidents diagnosis, we part company with his prescription.

Drug courts are part of a failed system that presumes we can punish our way out of addiction. Instead, research shows that people who use drugs need community-based harm reduction and treatment services, not the threat of criminal sanction.

If we want to move beyond the discredited War on Drugs and save lives, we must abandon the fixation on drug courts, invest in proven solutions, and let healthcare professionals not lawyers and judges guide treatment.

Drug courts arent new. For the last 30 years, the primary way the criminal justice system has attempted to connect people with substance use disorders to healthcare is via drug courts. In drug courts, people undergo court-monitored inpatient or outpatient treatment, often featuring frequent drug testing and stepped sanctions for noncompliance, such as failing a drug test or missing a court date, generally in exchange for a reduction or dismissal of charges.

Stepped sanctions can range from extra court appearances for periods of incarceration and the process of graduating from drug court may take six months to two years or more.

Many of the over3,000drug courts across the U.S. are supported by substantial federal spending. Some $40 million is invested in drug courts and drug court technical assistance every year by the federal government and president Biden haspledgedto increase that funding.

But that investment address neither the evidence nor the needs of our communities.

Drug courtsclaim to reduce recidivism when operating according to best practices, but the research supporting these claims warrants closer scrutiny. The evidence is highly skewed by the common practice of cherry-picking individuals most likely to succeed and excluding those most in need of care.

For example, a study found that although over half of the 907 individuals who died from overdoses in Philadelphia in 2016 had prior contact with the criminal legal system in the last two years,only ninewere deemed eligible to participate in drug court.

Additionally, many drug courtsarentrun according to best practices, juvenile drug courts in particular appear to actuallyincreaserecidivism, and some research shows that when individuals dont succeed in drug court they becomemorelikelyto be rearrested than if theyd just had their case handled conventionally.

And most importantly, reducing recidivism isnt the same as ending the criminalization of drug use, improving the health of people who use drugs, or improving community welfare and thoseshould be our primary goals when it comes to drug policy.

The evidence is clear that drug courts dont decrease incarceration rates.

While drug courts reduce initial sentences, that reduction in incarceration isoffsetby the time participants spend behind bars for sanctions as well as lengthier sentences imposed on people who fail to graduate from drug courts.

And studies have found that people who fail drug court programs receive sentences up totwo to five times longerthan conventionally sentenced defendants facing the same charges.

Many practitioners similarly have observed that drug courts expand the footprint of the justice system. Well-intentioned prosecutors or judges may sweep lower levels of cases into the drug court in the interest of forcing people into the intensive treatment drug courts entail, even when the burden of drug court is out of proportion with the offense they committed.

Meanwhile, drug courts are run by judges, not doctors, and that means they can befar from clinically sound, particularly when prosecutors or judges deny participants access to lifesaving opioid substitution therapies like methadone.

Jail sanctions arent treatment.

In fact, incarceration is linked with higher rates of suicide, the worsening of co-morbid mental health conditions, lower life expectancy, blood-borne virus transmission and the initiation of intravenous drug use.

Few drug courts even measuretheir impact on health outcomes like overdoses and mortality illustrating that improving health is not their primary concern.

There are multiple other criticisms that drug courts have facedfrom their fines and fees to the ethics of coerced treatment as a whole. We should invest in proven strategies and devote resources to live-savingharm reduction services, like street outreach, overdose prevention sites, and alternative first responders.

We need free easily accessible methadone and buprenorphine. And when people do come into contact with the criminal legal system, we need off-ramps from incarceration models thatdeflectpeople out of the legal system and into appropriate services, ensuring people receive evidence-based care without criminalizing them.

In the immediate future, drug courts remain a political reality. Theyre popular with judges, and sometimes have strong community buy-in because they offer a satisfying, if illusory, narrative of redemption.

There arethings prosecutors can doto make existing drug courts better, like ensuring they comport with best practices, incorporating harm reduction principles, and avoiding using them to punish drug use alone.

But in the longer term, drug courts arent the solution to reducing drug-related incarceration or saving lives. Criminal justice leaders must look at the evidence, and embrace a public health approach to drugswe urge the new administration to follow suit.

America deserves better. Weve lost too many lives already.

Miriam Krinsky is a former federal prosecutor and executive director ofFair and Just Prosecution.Leo Beletsky is a professor of law and health sciences and the faculty director of Northeastern University School of LawsHealth in Justice Action Lab.

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Why It's Time to Abandon Drug Courts - Crime Report

Cannabis should be regulated and taxed like alcohol and tobacco, ADPD have said.

The party was reacting to a statement by the Prime Minister Robert Abela where he announced that government will be launching a white paper on thedecriminalisationof cannabis for personal use.

Over the years, despite the rhetoric and crocodile tears, authorities have ignored the suffering of thousands of people because of the so-called and ridiculous war on whoever smokes a joint. Victims of hard drugs are also made into victims of the justice system, chairperson Carmel Cacopardo said.

In light of recently published statistics that sixty percent of cases before the drug tribunal are for the possession of cannabis, ADPD said this is leading to a waste of police resources and cannabis.

The criminalization of drug users has completely failed, as even the United Nations claims. Those who are victims of heavy drugs have also ended up being victimized all over again, because instead of medical and social assistance they have ended up stuck in the criminal justice system, spokesperson Samuel Muscat said.

Muscat insisted the party want a model similar to thePortugueseone.The Portuguese model hasworked,it has reduced the harm on users and reduced the abuse of drugs.

The resources being wasted in the war on drug victims should instead be used to strengthen the services of youth and community workers in our communities, to strengthen cultural and educational initiatives and community building skills.

He insisted the partys policy on cannabis is that of making it a legallyregulatedsubstance.

The sale of certain types of cannabis should be regulated in the same way as the sale of tobacco and alcohol is regulated and taxed, he said.

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Cannabis should be regulated like tobacco and alcohol, ADPD says - MaltaToday

In the final year of Donald Trumps presidency, more than 450,000 Americans died from COVID-19, and life expectancy fell by 1.13 years, the biggest decrease since World War II. Many of the deaths were avoidable; COVID-19 mortality in the U.S. was 40 percent higher than the average of the other wealthy nations in the Group of Seven (G7).

In a Lancet report by the Commission on Public Policy and Health in the Trump Era, released on February 20, we chronicled Trump's effects on population health. His incompetent and malevolent response to the COVID-19 pandemic capped a presidency suffused with health-harming policies and actions.

However, we also found that Americans' health began lagging before Trump took office. In 1980, U.S. life expectancy was similar to that of other G7 nations; by 2018 it was 3.4 years shorter. 461,000 deaths would have been averted in 2018 if U.S. life expectancy had kept pace with the rest of the G7. Thats equivalent to the number of Americans who died from COVID-19 last year.

Faced with the pandemic, Trump suppressed scientific data, delayed testing, mocked and blocked mask-wearing, and convened mass gatherings where social distancing was impossible. Despite the mounting threats of COVID-19 and global warming, he pulled the U.S. out of the World Health Organization and the Paris climate accord. He installed industry insiders in regulatory posts tasked with protecting Americans from environmental and occupational hazards; their regulatory rollbacks resulted in 22,000 excess deaths from such hazards in 2019 alone. He pushed through a $1.9 trillion tax cut for the wealthy, creating a budget hole that he then used to justify cutting food and housing assistance for the needy. He tried, but failed, to repeal the ACA, then bent every effort to undermine it, pushing up the number of uninsured Americans by 2.3 million. He denied entry to refugees fleeing violence, abused immigrant detainees, and penalized immigrants for accessing basic social services.

Although Trump bears special blame for Americas health woes, many of his policies did not represent a radical break with the past. Both Republican and Democratic administrations have pursed economic, health and social policies deleterious to population health.

Nixons racially targeted war on drugs initiated mass incarceration, compromising the health of prisoners, their families and others in their communities. Starting in the Reagan era, financial deregulation, trade deals favoring corporations and attacks on union labor caused de-industrialization and increased income precarity in many parts of the country, contributing to an epidemic of deaths of despair. Bill Clintons welfare cuts and tough-on-crime measures compromised the life chances of many Americans, particularly Black and brown Americans. Market-based health care reforms dating to Reagan, and endorsed by Democrats and Republicans alike, have commercialized and bureaucratized medical care, raising costs and shifting care toward the wealthy. And corporate lobbyists have blocked regulation of dangerous products like firearms, obesogenic foods and addictive medications.

These longstanding policies have contributed to persistent race-based health gaps bequeathed by the legacies of slavery, Jim Crow segregation and Native American genocide, and widening gaps by income, education and geography. And the pattern of government neglect set the stage for the racist and nativist appeals Trump used to fuel his political rise. In 2016, Trump gained his largest electoral margins in counties with the worst mortality trends.

Fortunately, many of the policies needed to ameliorate COVID-19s damage would also begin to address the longer-standing mortality crisis. We need more than vaccinations. We need universal paid sick leave, Medicare for All, environmental and workplace protections, income supports and affordable housing to limit crowding and ensure food security, alternatives to incarceration, public health infrastructure, investments in education and compensation to Native and Black Americans for the wealth and labor confiscated from them.

It is tempting, after the chaos of the Trump years, to seek a return to normal. But normal in the U.S. was deadly for hundreds of thousands of Americans every year. Our nations public health and social policy infrastructure has suffered 40 years of neglect. Failing to repair it will ensure that the U.S. remains vulnerable to the next health crisis, that health inequities will persist and that our politics will remain mired in division.

As the Biden Administration looks to the future, we need massive reinvestment in the conditions needed for a healthy population.

This is an opinion and analysis article.

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Trump's Policy Failures Have Exacted a Heavy Toll on Public Health - Scientific American