Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Drug policy should focus on helping addicts, not jailing them
The Baltimore Sun ^ | June 28, 2006 | Taylor W. Buley

Posted on 07/04/2006 5:20:13 PM PDT by neverdem

Two years ago, my 23-year-old brother became addicted to painkillers after breaking his leg and undergoing several operations to repair it.

Last year, while he was checking into rehab for abusing OxyContin, I was drafting a chapter in my new book calling for drug legalization. It was a difficult moment to believe in individual liberty: I felt firsthand the effects of what it's like when people make bad decisions. I saw how hard my brother struggled to get clean, first moving forward and then backsliding again into substance abuse.

One of the more compelling arguments for the war on drugs is that if we allow people to freely buy and use all sorts of currently illegal drugs, some people will end up becoming addicted when they otherwise would have been deterred by criminal penalties.

This, however, is a false choice: It ignores the fact that many people are - as my brother was before treatment - already addicted to harmful substances. Local, state and federal governments directly spend more than $40 billion a year on what's typically called the war on drugs.

Virtually all of that money is spent on trying to interdict drugs as they enter the country or arresting drug users and drug sellers. Our current aim of preventing people from becoming addicted to harmful substances misses the mark.

A better focus - and one that would eliminate the violence and crime associated with black markets and reduce the social harms of addiction - would be to ask: What's the best way we can encourage people who have drug problems to seek treatment?

Baltimore has been a prime example of how successful we can be when we stop worrying about drug abuse and start worrying about drug abusers.

In 1999, Baltimore and the Maryland General Assembly began a...

(Excerpt) Read more at baltimoresun.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events; US: District of Columbia; US: Maryland
KEYWORDS: addiction; drugskilledbelushi; leroyknowshisrights; liberty; waronsomedrugs; wod; wodlist; wosd
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-34 next last
Happy Fourth of July!
1 posted on 07/04/2006 5:20:16 PM PDT by neverdem
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: neverdem
I agree. Treat them first but make sure if they don't clean up their lives, they go straight to jail.

(The Palestinian terrorist regime is the crisis and Israel's fist is the answer.)

2 posted on 07/04/2006 5:23:45 PM PDT by goldstategop (In Memory Of A Dearly Beloved Friend Who Lives On In My Heart Forever)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

Why do we owe this to anyone?

Drug addicts should be helping me, I feel. When I mess up, they should bail me out. That sounds fair.


3 posted on 07/04/2006 5:24:38 PM PDT by SteveMcKing
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

"It ignores the fact that many people are - as my brother was before treatment - already addicted to harmful substances."

This is confusing, was his brother ALREADY a drug addict, before he had the leg problem? Or does he mean the rehab cured him?


4 posted on 07/04/2006 5:26:43 PM PDT by jocon307 (The Silent Majority - silent no longer)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

The failed war on some drugs is a farce.


5 posted on 07/04/2006 5:28:50 PM PDT by mysterio
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SteveMcKing

There is a difference between someone who gets hooked while using illegal drugs recreationally and one who becomes addicted to prescription medicine while recovering from a medical injury, espeically if the firm which produced the drug didn't warn that it could be addictive.


6 posted on 07/04/2006 5:28:52 PM PDT by Clintonfatigued (Illegal aliens commit crimes that Americans won't commit)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: goldstategop

I'd go so far as to allow 10,000 addicts to kill themselves with as many drugs as possible rather then seeing 1 more pre-dawn no-knock raid on the wrong house by an out of control para-military civilian police force searching for a bag of weed.


7 posted on 07/04/2006 5:35:11 PM PDT by JoeSixPack1
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: JoeSixPack1
"What's the best way we can encourage people who have drug problems to seek treatment?"

It's like "encouraging" a bear not to **** in the woods. It's madness, classic victimology to apologize for drug users.

8 posted on 07/04/2006 5:39:11 PM PDT by SteveMcKing
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: JoeSixPack1

Plus its a program that lines the pockets of organized crime.


9 posted on 07/04/2006 5:45:31 PM PDT by spanalot
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: jocon307
This is confusing, was his brother ALREADY a drug addict, before he had the leg problem? Or does he mean the rehab cured him?
That's what every drug researcher and addictions treatment person is gonna tell you. In theory, there's a one in ten chance that anyone is addicted to something... just blind luck that most of us never find out what it is. And, a person with one type of addiction is likely to have others. It's why alcoholics also avoid narcotics, and narcotics addicts don't drink.
10 posted on 07/04/2006 5:47:23 PM PDT by rpgdfmx
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: jocon307
This is confusing, was his brother ALREADY a drug addict, before he had the leg problem? Or does he mean the rehab cured him?

"Two years ago, my 23-year-old brother became addicted to painkillers after breaking his leg and undergoing several operations to repair it."

--snip--

"It may have taken several bad decisions and two rounds of rehab, but today my brother knows more about personal responsibility..."

He became addicted after the injury. He needed two courses of rehab because he relapsed after the first.

11 posted on 07/04/2006 5:58:12 PM PDT by neverdem (May you be in heaven a half hour before the devil knows that you're dead.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 4 | View Replies]

To: neverdem

relapsed

yeh.

He decided to take the stuff again. Using "relapse" or even "slip" attempts to avoid personal responsibility......"relapses" are addicting, too, as is a poor little victim type sponsor or therapist.


12 posted on 07/04/2006 6:10:48 PM PDT by Vn_survivor_67-68
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Clintonfatigued
There is a difference between someone who gets hooked while using illegal drugs recreationally and one who becomes addicted to prescription medicine

Both individuals have used a drug illegally to their detriment.

I see no reason to draw lines of demarcation.

Each should be offered treatment before jail time.

13 posted on 07/04/2006 6:15:47 PM PDT by vikzilla
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 6 | View Replies]

To: vikzilla

I agree completely.

Treat them both the same. They are actually the same people, just at different places in their addiction.


14 posted on 07/04/2006 6:23:18 PM PDT by i_dont_chat (Southwest Houston, TX)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 13 | View Replies]

To: neverdem
Government tends to get more of whatever it subsidizes.

If you make addicts' landings soft and charge the costs to the taxpayer, you should not be surprised if you see more addicts and more frequent relapses.

15 posted on 07/04/2006 6:27:41 PM PDT by JCEccles
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: SteveMcKing

I would make a deal with drug addicts....The government will leave you alone to do your drugs.... but they will not chase you down to put you into rehab.


16 posted on 07/04/2006 6:38:51 PM PDT by markoman (The man with the rubber glove was....surprisingly gentle.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: JCEccles
If you make addicts' landings soft and charge the costs to the taxpayer, you should not be surprised if you see more addicts and more frequent relapses.

Yea, well, that would matter, if the cost of being addicted were actually significant, in a legalized regime, such as occured in the US between the Civil War and World War I.

17 posted on 07/04/2006 6:52:07 PM PDT by donh (U)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 15 | View Replies]

To: All
Let's face the fact that as a society, we will be dealing with this problem till Kingdom come.

The best we can do is look for a comfortable middle ground. By comfortable, I mean a balance of:

education of the hazards of drugs for our youth

lowest cost and danger to our citizens as a whole

respect of individual freedom and personal responsibility

We are not going to completely eliminate drug abuse.

Seems to me the magic formula for this problem as with most other social problems is to make the problem more of a pain to the addict than it is to society. (a take on the personal responsibility angle)

18 posted on 07/04/2006 7:17:52 PM PDT by winston2 (In matters of necessity let there be unity, in matters of doubt liberty, and in all things charity:-)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]

To: JoeSixPack1
I'd go so far as to allow 10,000 addicts to kill themselves with as many drugs as possible rather then seeing 1 more pre-dawn no-knock raid on the wrong house by an out of control para-military civilian police force searching for a bag of weed.

Amen!

The War On Drugs has become a cancer on America.

19 posted on 07/04/2006 7:28:40 PM PDT by LPM1888 ("If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: LPM1888

I think child molesters should be rehabilitated, too, rather than thrown in jail or constantly tracked down like a North Korea missile.

The war on perverts has become a cancer on America.

/sarcasm


20 posted on 07/04/2006 8:52:11 PM PDT by abercrombie_guy_38
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-34 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson