Government Moves More Toward Treating Addiction as Illness

[FrenchieCat]

White House Shifts Away From ‘War on Drugs’ Rhetoric
Government Moves More Toward Treating Addiction as Illness
By Mike Lillis 3/18/10

Quietly, free of headlines and fanfare, the Obama White House is toning down the bellicose “war-on-drugs” position that’s defined the country’s narcotics policy for the last 25 years.

Appearing in Vienna last week for the 53rd annual United Nations meeting on global drug policy, administration officials shifted away from the decades-old approach of attacking drug use as a crime to be penalized. Instead they moved toward a strategy of tackling addiction as an illness to be treated, a number of health and human rights advocates who attended the event told TWI.

Drug reformers for years have promoted so-called “harm reduction” measures as a more effective and humane way to treat drug addiction and the diseases that often accompany it — an approach that runs counter to the punitive attitude epitomized by the Reagan administration’s “war on drugs.” And while the Obama White House — behind Gil Kerlikowske, the White House drug czar, and his deputy, Thomas McLellan — remains officially opposed to the hot-button harm reduction language, officials have also conceded that the current strategy isn’t working, advocates say. That sharp break from past administrations has left reformers hopeful that the Obama White House will mark a new era in the nation’s fight against drug abuse — one that prioritizes treatment and prevention above rap sheets and prison time.

“There was virtually no reference to a criminal justice approach,” Allan Clear, executive director of the Harm Reduction Coalition, an advocacy group, said of the U.S. delegation in Vienna. “I’m just so used to being appalled by their behavior … It was very encouraging.”


More..... http://washingtonindependent.com/79552/white-house-shifts-away-from-war-on-drugs-rhetoric

[Webster Green]

1. The renegades at the DEA are still out of control.

Still stealing medicine from sick people after we were told it would stop.

Talk is cheap. Someone needs to tell the pigs to stop busting for medical pot.

Legalize all of it. Eliminate the black market.

[my2sense]

2. I can see the rethuglican heads exploding now....

I'm impressed that this administration is not repeating the same old tired ways expecting different results!

[leftstreet]

3. Hmm...Mandatory Insurance payments / drugs as treatable illness

hmm...

[nebenaube]

4. They are never going to legalize weed.

Rather, you can have your weed, but off to the 'treatment' facility you go and god only knows how much they will charge you for it.

[Cha]

5. Only makes good sense!

Here's to the beginning of a complete 180 on this.

[FrenchieCat]

6. Yep......

all in good time.

40 years of fucked up policy to reverse,
and sounds like each year will be a vast improvement,
done nice and quietly so we dont have to hear the howls of the
Rightwinged assholes and their fucked up media whores.

[Cha]

7. Oh yeah!

:hippie:

[Romulox]

8. AG Holder and the DEA still busting Medical Marijuana dispensaries, so this is a lot of talk. nt

[NightWatcher]

9. Bullshit! I'll believe that when the DEA stops raiding medical marijuana dispensaries