CANNABIS LAWS

Sir,

Warren Bryson (February 13) asks for alternatives to drug liberalisation.
Sweden passed the very laws he is promoting in the 1960s with a disastrous
increase in youth cannabis use and subsequent harm. By 1969 Sweden had
recriminalised cannabis and progressively set in motion intelligent laws
that constructively used prohibition to leverage drug users into
treatment rather than be incarcerated.

The results have been spectacular as best demonstrated by the 1997 UN World
Drug Report that put lifetime drug use of Swedish 15-29 year-olds at a
paltry 9 percent versus 53 percent for the same age cohort in Australia (a
country with cannabis usage rates similar to New Zealand's).

Just because liberalisation proponents such as your correspondent have
succeeded in influencing government agencies in some countries is no reason
for us to follow. Our current laws are ineffective but let us replace them
with models that actually reduce drug usage not increase it.

J.J McIntyre

February 13, 2001