more people are addicted to and die from prescription medications than the organic psychotropes that are the focus of the drug war. when countries like the UK and the Netherlands have experimented with legalization of heroin, they found the crime rate and addiction rate to drop.
the drug war, like all other wars, is a fraud and only serves to enrich the people who finance it.
So your solution to people dying from prescription drugs is to make things worse?
i haven't proposed any solution. just made a statement of fact.
the entire approach to food and drugs by the united states government needs a serious overhaul.
organic substances that have been medicine for thousands of years are suddenly demonized in the last century and replaced with synthetic analogs that are more dangerous and nowhere near as effective as the drug they replaced.
my favorite example is valium which is a patented analog of the active ingredient in valerian root. i don't have the current figures but there are millions of people addicted to valium and lots of suicides by overdose. if you have ever smelled or tasted valerian root tea you would know that abuse of that substance is unlikely --- shit smells and tastes like dirty old socks but a pill goes down easy.
cui bono? follow the money and you will see giant pharmaceutical houses and drug kingpins making mountains of it at the expense of everybody else's health and safety.
Nowhere near as effective? What have you been smoking??