ZERO TOLERANCE COMPOUNDS PROBLEM

The Nov. 1 editorial, "Another Kind Of Ruin," on the drug war, noted that
"Alcohol wrecked lives long before cocaine, heroin or methamphetamine."
Alcohol continues to wreck lives.

The Observer is to be commended for addressing America's No. 1 drug problem
in a straightforward manner. When the subject of the drug war comes up, the
deadliest recreational drug is often overlooked.

Alcohol kills more Americans every year than all illegal drugs combined and
is the drug most often associated with violent behavior. We tried
prohibiting alcohol once, with disastrous results. Organized crime
flourished and children had easier access to alcohol than ever once
mobsters took over the distribution.

These days, liquor producers no longer gun each other down in drive-by
shootings, nor do consumers risk blindness drinking bathtub gin. While U.S.
politicians continue to ignore the parallels between the drug war and our
failed experiment with alcohol prohibition, European countries are
embracing harm reduction, a public-health alternative based on the
principle that both drug use and drug prohibition have the potential to
cause harm.

Examples of harm reduction include needle exchange programs to stop the
spread of HIV, marijuana regulation aimed at separating the hard and soft
drug markets, and a range of drug treatment alternatives that do not
require incarceration as a prerequisite.

The zero tolerance approach, favored by U.S. politicians, only compounds
the problem. Would alcoholics seek help for their addiction if doing so
were tantamount to confessing to criminal activity?

Robert Sharpe, Program officer, The Lindesmith Center Drug Policy Foundation

Washington, D.C.