Better world: Legalise drugs

[n2doc]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327251.100-legalise-drugs.html

11 September 2009 by Clare Wilson

SO FAR this year, about 4000 people have died in Mexico's drugs war - a horrifying toll. If only a good fairy could wave a magic wand and make all illegal drugs disappear, the world would be a better place.

Dream on. Recreational drug use is as old as humanity, and has not been stopped by the most draconian laws. Given that drugs are here to stay, how do we limit the harm they do?

The evidence suggests most of the problems stem not from drugs themselves, but from the fact that they are illegal. The obvious answer, then, is to make them legal.

The argument most often deployed in support of the status quo is that keeping drugs illegal curbs drug use among the law-abiding majority, thereby reducing harm overall. But a closer look reveals that this really doesn't stand up. In the UK, as in many countries, the real clampdown on drugs started in the late 1960s, yet government statistics show that the number of heroin or cocaine addicts seen by the health service has grown ever since - from around 1000 people per year then, to 100,000 today. It is a pattern that has been repeated the world over.

more at link

[rcrush]

1. It can be said that legalizing the less harmful drugs could cut down on other drug use

I read that the criminalizing of less harmful drugs in certain areas led some people to start mixing chemicals together to make meth cause the chemicals themselves are not illegal or expensive.

[endless october]

2. end the drug war, fund single payer with it. n/t

[Luminous Animal]

3. Decriminalization has worked in Portugal.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=10080