I remember when I first learned about drugs. At the mere age of 9, I was under the influence — of D.A.R.E.
The world of illicit drugs seemed mysterious and dangerous but never particularly luring. Since then, my ill dispositions toward the recreational use of substances, like alcohol and marijuana, have mostly dissipated.
On the other hand, I have always conceded that the use of cocaine and other illicit drugs often transcend recreation and enter territory of physical and social disruption.
For this very reason, I saw Dr. Nicholas Goeders’ cocaine dependency research as substantially beneficial to society. However, I find it disconcerting that everyone wouldn’t agree.
Goeders heads the Department of Pharmacology, Toxicology and Neuroscience at the LSU Health Sciences Center in Shreveport.
His research centers on EMB-001, a drug in the clinical trial phase that has the potential to end dependency to cocaine and possibly other substances.
People like to trumpet the idea of drug abuse prevention as if it means anything. Preventative measures and preemptive strikes have been the main tactics of America’s 40-year $1 trillion War on Drugs and haven’t generated any exceptional results.
Since the 1970s, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) has annually compiled statistics on citizens who have abused drugs within one month of taking the survey.
This statistic, which follows those aged 12 and older, has been as high as 14.1 percent of the population in 1979 and as low as 5.9 in 1993. The most recent figures of 1999-2009 show a steady rise from 6.3 percent to 8.7 percent.
While some would use this as evidence to pump more money and human resources into the collective drug war giant, I can only interpret these oscillating results as affirmation that the war on drugs is wasteful.
The solution to drug dependency does not require violence. European countries, like Portugal and Switzerland, are now instituting alternative drug policies focusing on treatment, rather than criminalization and incarceration.
By decriminalizing illicit drugs in 2000 and treating their abuse as a public health problem, rather than a crime problem, Portugal has transformed entire communities from horrific drug slums to blue-collar towns. According to the Associated Press, one such community is Casal Ventoso, a place where thousands of heroine users used to assemble.
Rather than incarceration, the country’s first response is to instate addicts in rehabilitation centers, with a fine for those who don’t comply.
In Switzerland, no one has died from heroine overdose since 1994 because of pro-treatment policies — an incredibly foreign idea here in the U.S.
But the U.S. is starting to take notice. John Roman, a researcher at the Urban Institute’s Justice Policy Center, found that handling addicts as treatable patients would cost the United States $13 billion but would save $40 billion in the process.
With a population substantially larger than that of Portugal, it’s not advisable to decriminalize all drug use like that country has. Despite this, we should eliminate our prejudice toward drug users as lost souls to society who need to be locked away. These people need assistance.
Although the NSDUH reported in 2009 that 23 million Americas have tried cocaine, only 1.1 million people were considered dependent on the substance. Even if we implement a policy that prevents 90 percent of all cocaine dependence, we’d still be left will 110,000 addicts who need treatment.
Whether it’s illegal, drug abuse will always exist in our society, and these people can’t be abandoned.
This is precisely why Goeders’ work is important. Breakthroughs like his will become the foundation for a shift in the way political policy handles addiction.
Allowing addicts to overcome their drug dependencies isn’t an unwarranted reward. It’s a humane right that needs to gain recognition.