Bfgrn
Gold Member
- Apr 4, 2009
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Nothing new there.
More people die of prescribed drugs than every died from non-prescrption drugs.
That's been true for at least the last four decades that I know of.
ZERO people died from Marijuana, incidently.
ZERO!
Amy Whinehouse was probably the least surprising personality to pass from drug abuse.
Whitney was in the top 5.
Which brings us to the dumbest comment of the day:
Tony Bennett:
"First it was Michael Jackson, then there was Amy Winehouse, and now the magnificent Whitney Houston. I'd like to have every gentleman and lady in this room commit themselves to get on government to legalize drugs.
Tony Bennett Calls For Legalization Of Drugs Just Hours After Whitney Died | PerezHilton.com
Tony is right.
Ten years ago, Portugal became the first Western nation to pass full-scale, nationwide decriminalization. That law, passed Oct. 1, 2000, abolished criminal sanctions for all narcotics not just marijuana but also "hard drugs" like heroin and cocaine.
This applies only to drugs for personal use; drug trafficking remains a criminal offense. There is now a decade's worth of empirical data on what actually happens and does not happen when criminal sanctions against drug possession are lifted.
By any metric, Portugal's drug-decriminalization scheme has been a resounding success.
Individuals caught with drugs in Portugal are no longer arrested or treated as criminals. Instead, they are sent to a tribunal of health professionals, where they are offered the opportunity, but are not compelled, to seek government-provided treatment.
For those found to be addicts, tribunals have the power to impose noncriminal sanctions. But in practice, the overriding goal is to direct people to treatment.
By any metric, Portugal's drug-decriminalization scheme has been a resounding success. Drug usage in many categories has decreased in absolute terms, including for key demographic groups, like 15-to-19-year-olds. Where usage rates have increased, the increases have been modest far less than in most other European Union nations, which continue to use a criminalization approach.
Portugal, whose drug problems were among the worst in Europe, now has the lowest usage rate for marijuana and one of the lowest for cocaine. Drug-related pathologies, including HIV transmission, hepatitis transmission and drug-related deaths, have declined significantly.
Compared to the European Union and the U.S., Portugal's drug use numbers are impressive. Following decriminalization, Portugal had the lowest rate of lifetime marijuana use in people over 15 in the E.U.: 10%. The most comparable figure in America is in people over 12: 39.8%. Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana.
The Cato paper reports that between 2001 and 2006 in Portugal, rates of lifetime use of any illegal drug among seventh through ninth graders fell from 14.1% to 10.6%; drug use in older teens also declined. Lifetime heroin use among 16-to-18-year-olds fell from 2.5% to 1.8% (although there was a slight increase in marijuana use in that age group). New HIV infections in drug users fell by 17% between 1999 and 2003, and deaths related to heroin and similar drugs were cut by more than half. In addition, the number of people on methadone and buprenorphine treatment for drug addiction rose to 14,877 from 6,040, after decriminalization, and money saved on enforcement allowed for increased funding of drug-free treatment as well.
Read more: Decriminalizing Drugs in Portugal a Success, Says Report - TIME