Insanity

Insanity has been defined as repetition of the same action with expectations of a different result. This is also a perfect definition of America's war on drugs, which has employed the same techniques for the past forty years with no results. A recent report by the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, led by former presidents Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico, Cesar Gaviria of Colombia and Fernando Henrique Cardoso of Brazil, calls out the United States on this issue.

Here are some highlights from an op-ed article by the three former heads of state in the Wall Street Journal summarizing the report:

Prohibitionist policies based on eradication, interdiction and criminalization of consumption simply haven't worked. Violence and the organized crime associated with the narcotics trade remain critical problems in our countries. Latin America remains the world's largest exporter of cocaine and cannabis, and is fast becoming a major supplier of opium and heroin. Today, we are further than ever from the goal of eradicating drugs.

Despite some of the world's strictest drug laws, combined hard-core-user prevalence rates for hard drugs are four times higher than in Europe.

The first step in the search for alternative solutions is to acknowledge the disastrous consequences of current policies. Next, we must shatter the taboos that inhibit public debate about drugs in our societies. Antinarcotic policies are firmly rooted in prejudices and fears that sometimes bear little relation to reality. The association of drugs with crime segregates addicts in closed circles where they become even more exposed to organized crime.

In order to drastically reduce the harm caused by narcotics, the long-term solution is to reduce demand for drugs in the main consumer countries. To move in this direction, it is essential to differentiate among illicit substances according to the harm they inflict on people’s health, and the harm drugs cause to the social fabric.

In this spirit, we propose a paradigm shift in drug policies based on three guiding principles: Reduce the harm caused by drugs, decrease drug consumption through education, and aggressively combat organized crime. To translate this new paradigm into action we must start by changing the status of addicts from drug buyers in the illegal market to patients cared for by the public-health system.

We also propose the careful evaluation, from a public-health standpoint, of the possibility of decriminalizing the possession of cannabis for personal use. Cannabis is by far the most widely used drug in Latin America, and we acknowledge that its consumption has an adverse impact on health. But the available empirical evidence shows that the hazards caused by cannabis are similar to the harm caused by alcohol or tobacco.

I particularly agree with this statement: "we must shatter the taboos that inhibit public debate about drugs in our societies. Anti-narcotic policies are firmly rooted in prejudices and fears that sometimes bear little relation to reality," this is the reason such insanity has been allowed to continue for so long. It's time to get the facts straight and debunk the myths, only then can we move forward towards a practical (and obtainable) solution!