Does decriminalizing all illegal drugs make sense?

Does decriminalizing all illegal drugs make sense?

To decrease the number of robberies to buy drugs, homicides related to territorial disputes, and to curb a huge subterranean economy anchored in drug money, why not legalize banned addictive drugs altogether? There are 1.5 million drug arrests each year and more imprisoned inmates for drug offenses than all violent criminals combined. Moreover, the Drug Enforcement Agency has about 10,000 agents and support staff who could be fighting real crime and terrorism.

William F. Buckley Jr, the conservative pundit who founded the National Review magazine, was one of the first to advocate legalizing illegal drugs. Certainly, history bears testimony to the fact that no efforts have been successful in preventing the cultivation or manufacture of illegal mind-altering substances and all interdiction efforts have failed to stop the inflow of illegal drugs through our porous borders. Meanwhile, ‘drug money’ and drug trafficking has bred gangs and gang warfare in all major cities that kills thousands each year in many countries across the globe and the illegality of drug usage has prevented many addicts from seeking treatment.

Perhaps it is time for law enforcement to give up and ‘call in the dogs.’ The U.S. Federal Government could economically manufacture, regulate, test, monitor and tax illegal drugs. The first measurable result would be a decrease in deaths from overdose due to varying purity of these products. With the tax revenues, the Government could launch a comprehensive program of education and rehabilitation. It certainly would be cheaper than policing the violent crimes related to drugs and incarcerating millions of drug dealers and nonviolent users.

Extensive drug testing in the work place would be a major force in controlling drug use by employees. Random drug testing could become a routine in the workplace. Few workers want to work side-by-side with ‘druggies’ as the effects of these agents increase work risks and absenteeism as well as decrease productivity. Mandated treatment for addicted pregnant females would need to be imposed.

MADD has had remarkable success in curtailing drunk driving and I would think that traffic offenses due to illegal drugs would respond to similar measures. The legislative battles over the recreational use of Marijuana are similar to those during the Prohibition era. Marijuana has fewer societal costs than cigarette smoking; why not offer cheap cannabis to take the drug money and cartels out of the mix; standardize the product and, track and tax it?

Some would argue that cheap, legalized drugs would skyrocket drug use and abuse. There might be an initial spike in drug experimentation when these substances become more affordable. But the side effects and hangovers from these substances are so devastating and unpleasant that I believe it would be a short-lived spike. A massive education campaign about the health and social effects of these lethal substances would be a critical center piece of such legislation as well as enhanced medical programs to treat and counsel addicts. Cocaine, crack cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine destroy lives. An informed individual is not powerless to ‘just say no’ or quit, if already addicted, when an accessible rehabilitation program is in place.

With this societal reengineering, I feel certain there would be many unintended consequences that are difficult to predict. One positive consequence is that the FDA or a similar agency would research these drugs to begin to understand their effect on the human body and perhaps derive new medications for the treatment of medical illnesses. Certainly, it would decrease the crime rate and devastate the internecine drug culture.

Our society continues to grapple with addiction to legal prescription drugs. In the health marketplace leading edge information technology is poised to better track medications and prescribing behaviors and I think the abuse of and street market for pain killers will become less of a problem in the future.

In a more perfect world, there should be better solutions, but all else has failed dismally and it may be time to throw in the towel and search for less punitive solutions. One thing is certain, you must be able to nullify ‘drug money’, if you are going to make inroads in solving the drug problem.

Richard G. Wendel MD, MBA

Comments

  1. THIS IS A JOKE RIGHT?…..WHO IN THEIR RIGHT/SANE MIND WOULD DESTROY THE NEXT GENERATION BY MAKING ADDICTIVE DRUGS LEGAL…… EVER SAW A CHILD BORN ADDICTED TO HEROIN?….OR COCAINE?…..EVEN POT HEADS/ALCOHOLICS HAVE MESSED UP KIDS…..THE ONLY GROUP THAT WILL BENEFIT IS THE MEDICAL COMMUNITY….THEY WILL BE STUCK WITH TRYING TO FIX THESE KIDS[WITH MORE DRUGS}….. LOOK AT HOW THE ” DRUG LORDS” HAVE TO LIVE AND HOW THEY DIE……..WATCH A KID DIE FROM OVERDOSE…..WATCH AS A HIGH SCHOOL GIRL GO FROM CHEERLEADER TO STREET HOOKER SLAMMING “DOG”…OR A STAR ATHLETE STEAL/ROB/LIE AND SPEND TIME IN JAIL WITH STREET THUGS AND OTHER TRASH……THROWING UP IN THE HOLDING SECTION OF THE JUSTICE CENTER-WHILE COMING OFF AN DOSE OF HEROIN…..SURE THAT IS A GREAT IDEA TO LEGALIZE……TAKE THE SMOKING RELATED AND DRINKING RELATED DISEASED PERSONS OUT OF THE HOSPITAL……THE PLACE WOULD BE NEARLY EMPTY……LEGALIZATION HAS BEEN KICKED AROUND SINCE THE LATE 60’S……SEEMS TO ME THE ONLY THING THAT WORKS IS THOSE WHO USE DRUGS SEEM TO DIE OFF EARLY AND SEEM TO TAKE THEIR FELLOW USERS WITH THEM…. OH WELL……..

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