An Overview of Drug Policies and the Effects in Three Western Democracies

Portugal:

From Scientific American

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=portug...

In the face of a growing number of deaths and cases of HIV linked to drug abuse, the Portuguese government in 2001 tried a new tack to get a handle on the problem—it decriminalized the use and possession of heroin, cocaine, marijuana, LSD and other illicit street drugs. The theory: focusing on treatment and prevention instead of jailing users would decrease the number of deaths and infections.

Five years later, the number of deaths from street drug overdoses dropped from around 400 to 290 annually, and the number of new HIV cases caused by using dirty needles to inject heroin, cocaine and other illegal substances plummeted from nearly 1,400 in 2000 to about 400 in 2006, according to a report released recently by the Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C, libertarian think tank.

...Walter Kemp, a spokesperson for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, says decriminalization in Portugal "appears to be working."

from Time Magazine:

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

Compared to the European Union and the U.S., Portugal's drug use numbers are impressive. Following decriminalization, Portugal had the lowest rate of lifetime marijuana use in people over 15 in the E.U.: 10%. The most comparable figure in America is in people over 12: 39.8%. Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana.

The Netherlands

The Netherlands does not have legal cannabis but they have gone through stages of liberalizing their enforcement of laws regarding it. Here's some info from a three decade-long look at cannabis usage there.

http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/1/parlbus/commbus/senate/com-e...

Most probably cannabis use among youth in the Netherlands so far evolved in two waves, with a first peak around 1970, a low during the late 1970s and early 1980s, and a second peak in the mid 1990s.

It is striking that the trend in cannabis use among youth in the Netherlands rather parallels the four stages in the availability of cannabis identified above. The number of adolescent cannabis users peaked when the cannabis was distributed through an underground market (late 1960s and early 1970s). Then the number decreased as house dealers were superseding the underground market (1970s), and went up again after coffee shops took over the sale of cannabis (1980s), and stabilised or slightly decreased by the end of the 1990s when the number of coffee shops was reduced.

The United States

A 2008 study from the World Health Organization

http://www.mpp.org/library/toward-a-global-view-of.html

The U.S. has some of the world's most punitive drug policies and also the world's highest rates of marijuana and cocaine use, according to this World Health Organization survey of 17 countries, conducted by some of the world's leading substance abuse researchers. The Netherlands, where adults are allowed to possess and purchase small amounts of marijuana from regulated businesses, has a marijuana use rate less than half of ours.

The Cato paper reports that between 2001 and 2006 in Portugal, rates of lifetime use of any illegal drug among seventh through ninth graders fell from 14.1% to 10.6%; drug use in older teens also declined. Lifetime heroin use among 16-to-18-year-olds fell from 2.5% to 1.8% (although there was a slight increase in marijuana use in that age group)

The crime and punishment approach to stemming drug use does not work. In the end it's purpose isn't even stemming drug use it is just to punish and imprison those that refuse to cower before the drug warriors and their edicts or should I say propaganda (from what I've heard you can still get drugs in prison). Turning drugs from a legal problem to a medical problem is the only sensible way to go. That doesn't necessarily mean free wheeling open air drug markets where you can get everything form pot to acid to heroin but a reasonable approach to dealing with those that have chosen to use or unfortunately have become addicted. My idea would be legalize pot along the lines of beer or wine where users can purchase at licensed stores or grow their own. Of course there would be an age for legal use, probably 21 since that is the age for legal alcohol use. For other drugs I would support a more medical based rather than retail based approach where the user would have to go to a pharmacy or designated drug dispensary to get their drugs, needles, etc. That way you would have a chance to educate the people involved, offer treatment (which should be widely available at low or no cost) and otherwise oversee the health and well being of those that use. Bring drugs out of the shadows and the criminal realm and you will do a number of positive things such as lessen the crush in our prisons, badly weaken the gangs and cartels ability to make large amounts of cash by trafficking drugs, free our police to concentrate on real crimes and most importantly allow those that wish to stop using drugs to get treatment without fear of being arrested.