Exactly. It would be like making all pharmaceuticals available without a prescription. The illegal recreational pharmaceutical industry is causing people to medicate themselves without the scientific information necessary to know what they are doing. And, like taking pharmaceuticals without the care of a physician, people are taking a deadly chance as we are seeing with the drug overdose deaths and the harm they do to the body's cardiovascular system.
We have seen what happens with the legal use of nicotine. No one considered the scientific evidence of the harmful effects from the smoking a leaf impregnated with harmful chemicals. This is what happens when legalization is done without regard to safety. If they did, they would have changed the method of nicotine use long ago. The liquid "vaping" is a method that has taken too long as a safer alternative.
The human inclination to use a substance that creates euphoria has been an activity throughout history. If there is any legalization, scientist should come up with a safe substance--a Soma--as Aldous Huxley says it, which has "All the advantages of Christianity and alcohol; none of their defects." Until science develops a Soma, we need to keep the poisons out of people's hands. Mexico is growing heroine in fields that used to grow marijuana (unintended consequences to pot legalization). Building a wall on our southern border, detection of submarines and tunnels will keep the poisons off our streets. Our children need a more productive way at an occupation than doing drive-by shootings at other drug marketeers who muscle into their market.
I’d also suggest that a lot of the angst about heroin these days only exists because many of the overdose cases involve affluent white teens.
What should we do about the legal but unsafe drug alcohol?