LEGAL DRUG MARKET WON'T SOLVE A THING

In your Aug. 27 Letters to the Editor, a Ms. Givens says, "It's time to
repeal our lunatic drug laws and install a regulated market for adult use
that will eliminate the crime and destruction created by a useless
prohibition scheme."

How many crimes are committed today because addicts can't afford their
habits? Are we to disregard the studies that have shown that one joint is
equivalent to a pack of cigarettes? Since people who smoke dope inhale far
deeper than the regular smoker, how much sooner can we expect the same
damage that cigarettes do to appear in drug smokers?

Then who will the federal and state governments sue? Isn't the tobacco
industry regulated by the courts and the government now? Even putting
warnings on the drug packages won't protect the producer from lawsuits--it
didn't for the tobacco industry.

What government funding, besides welfare and Medicaid, is going to pay for
all the medical, not to mention the social, problems these people will
have? Drugs users want to have easy joy without thinking of the consequences.

Jim Heim
St. Louis County, Mo.