LEGALIZATION OF DRUGS WRONG, REGARDLESS OF HOW IT IS DONE

THE so-called harm-reduction approach to drugs confuses people with
terminology. All drug policies claim to reduce harm. No reasonable
person advocates a position consciously designed to be harmful. The
real question is which policies actually decrease harm and increase
good. The approach advocated by people who say they favor harm
reduction would in fact harm Americans.

The theory behind what they call harm reduction is that illegal drugs
cannot be controlled by law enforcement, education and other methods;
therefore, proponents say, harm should be reduced by needle exchange,
decriminalization of drugs, heroin maintenance and other measures. But
the real intent of many harm-reduction advocates is the legalization
of drugs, which would be a mistake.

Lest anyone question whether harm reductionists favor drug
legalization, let me quote some articles written by supporters of this
position. Ethan Nadelmann, director of the Lindesmith Center, a
Manhattan-based drug research institute, wrote in American Heritage
(March 1993): "Should we legalize drugs? History answers `yes.' " In
Issues in Science and Technology (June 1990), Nadelmann aligns his own
opinion with history's supposed verdict: "Personally, when I talk
about legalization, I mean three things: The first is to make drugs
such as marijuana, cocaine and heroin legal." With regard to labels,
Nadelmann wrote: "I much prefer the term `decriminalization' or
`normalization.' "

People who advocate legalization can call themselves anything they
like, but deceptive terms should not obscure a position so that it
can't be debated coherently. Changing the name of a plan doesn't
constitute a new solution or alter the nature of the problem.

The plain fact is that drug abuse wrecks lives. It is criminal that
more money is spent on illegal drugs than on art or higher education,
that crack babies are born addicted and in pain and that thousands of
adolescents lose their health and future to drugs.

Addictive drugs were criminalized because they are harmful; they are
not harmful because they were criminalized. The more a product is
available and legitimized, the greater will be its use.

If drugs were legalized in the United States, the cost to the
individual and society would grow astronomically. In the Netherlands,
when coffee shops started selling marijuana in small quantities, use
of this drug doubled between 1984 and 1992. A 1997 study by Robert
MacCoun and Peter Reuter from the University of Maryland notes that
the percentage of Dutch 18-year-olds who tried pot rose from 15
percent to 34 percent from 1984 to 1992, a time when the numbers
weren't climbing in other European nations. By contrast, in 1992
teen-age use of marijuana in the United States was estimated at 10.6
percent.

Many advocates of harm reduction consider drug use a part of the human
condition that will always be with us. While we agree that murder,
pedophilia and child prostitution can never be eliminated entirely, no
one is arguing that we legalize these activities.

Some measures, like heroin maintenance, proposed by activist harm
reductionists, veer toward the absurd. The Lindesmith Center
convened a meeting in June to discuss a multicity heroin
maintenance study, and a test program for heroin maintenance may
be launched in Baltimore. Arnold Trebach argues for heroin
maintenance in his book Legalize It? Debating American Drug
Policy: "Under the legalization plan I propose here, addicts ...
would be able to purchase the heroin and needles they need at
reasonable prices from a nonmedical drugstore."

Why would anyone choose to maintain addicts on heroin as opposed to
oral methadone, which eliminates the injection route associated with
HIV and other diseases? Research from the National Institute for Drug
Abuse shows that untreated addicts die at a rate seven to eight times
higher than similar patients in methadone-based treatment programs.

Dr. Avram Goldstein, in his book Addiction: From Biology to Drug
Policy, explains that when individuals switch from heroin to
methadone, general health improves and abnormalities of body
systems (such as the hormones) normalize. Unlike heroin
maintenance, methadone maintenance has no adverse effects on
cognitive or psychomotor function, performance of skilled tasks
or memory, he said. This research indicates that the choice of
heroin maintenance over methadone maintenance doesn't even meet
the criteria of harm reduction that advocates claim to apply.

Treatment must differ significantly from the disease it seeks to cure.
Otherwise, the solution resembles the circular reasoning spoofed in
Antoine de Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince by the character who
drinks because he has a terrible problem, namely, that he is a drunk.
Just as alcohol is no help for alcoholism, heroin is no cure for
heroin addiction.

As a society, we are successfully addressing drug use and its
consequences. In the past 20 years, drug use in the United States
decreased by half and casual cocaine use by 70 percent. Drug-related
murders and spending on drugs decreased by more than 30 percent as the
illegal drug market shrank.

Still, we are faced with many challenges, including educating a new
generation of children who may have little experience with the
negative consequences of drug abuse, increasing access to treatment
for 4 million addicted Americans and breaking the cycle of drugs and
crime that has caused a massive increase in the number of people
incarcerated. We need prevention programs, treatment and alternatives
to incarceration for nonviolent drug offenders. Drug legalization is
not a viable policy alternative because excusing harmful practices
only encourages them.

At best, harm reduction is a halfway measure, a halfhearted approach
that would accept defeat. Increasing help is better than decreasing
harm. The "1998 National Drug Control Strategy" -- a publication of
the Office of National Drug Control Policy that presents a balanced
mix of prevention, treatment, stiff law enforcement, interdiction and
international cooperation -- is a blueprint for reducing drug abuse
and its consequences by half over the coming decade. With science as
our guide and grass-roots organizations at the forefront, we will
succeed in controlling this problem.

Pretending that harmful activity will be reduced if we condone it
under the law is foolhardy and irresponsible.

McCaffrey is director of the Office of National Drug Control
Policy.

Checked-by: "Rich O'Grady"