Flawed approach to drug problem

UNTIL the early 1950s, heroin was legal in Australia. It was a commonly
prescribed analgesic for cancer sufferers. It was used for pain relief
during childbirth. It was an ingredient in many cough mixtures. Its supply
was regulated by the medical profession. National consumption was high by
international standards but addiction was almost unheardof. Still, when
Australia was put under international pressure (mainly by the United
States) to prohibit heroin in 1953, the government of the day did so.
Almost 30 years earlier, the same path had been followed with cannabis, a
drug most Australians had not heard much about, let alone inhaled.

Was it prescience which led those politicians in the '20s and '50s to ban
two drugs which would later come to be seen as the 'soft' and 'hard'
manifestations of the illicit drug trade? Or was it prohibition itself
which created the trade? Is it prohibition which perpetuates that trade today?

Each time a dollar is spent on law enforcement, the stakes increase for
those who peddle illicit drugs. As the risks increase, the drugs become
more valuable. The addict is driven further towards crime and becoming
smalltime dealers themselves, enticing others to buy heroin to help
finance their own habit. And those higher up the pyramid get even richer.

The moral crusaders who fear that relaxing drug laws will 'send the wrong
message' to society are themselves part of an immoral crusade which will
condemn future Australians to lives of addiction, criminality, disease and
death.

It would not be so bad if prohibition was merely ineffective in the fight
against drug addiction but there is a solid argument that it actually makes
the problem worse.

For the past 12 years, Australia has been developing a philosophy of harm
minimisation, devised to cope with the emerging AIDS threat and its link to
intravenous drug use. While governments have continued to grandstand about
law enforcement and the need for young people to 'just say no', treatment
programs and services have developed which regard illicit drug use from a
medical, rather than legal viewpoint. The aim is not so much abstinence as
safety. The heroin trial proposed earlier this year and supported by most
of the nation's health ministers was within this tradition. It was not a
cureall but might have added to the armoury of those who want to minimise
the toll of drug use. When the Prime Minister, John Howard, personally
vetoed the trial, there were inklings that harm minimisation itself might
be in the firing line. Those suspicions have been strengthened by the drug
strategy unveiled this week by Mr Howard.

The threepronged strategy is aimed at law enforcement, education and
rehabilitation.

Realistically, the first prong amounts to throwing good money after bad.

On the education front, Mr Howard wants a zero tolerance of drugs in
schools. It is unrealistic.

Rehabilitation is a worthy aim and the $30 million in extra funding pledged
by the Government is most welcome. But given that Mr Howard is pushing for
abstinencebased solutions (which have lower takeup rates and lower
success rates than maintenance programs) the outcomes of the extra
expenditure must be seen before its value can be determined.

Mr Howard mistakenly believes that the war against illicit drugs is one
which can be won.

He cannot yet see (and perhaps never will) that society is fighting a
monster of its own creation, hatched four decades ago when heroin stopped
being a powerful medicine and became an even more powerful illicit drug.