War on drugs or medical treatment

War on drugs can never be won

The “War on Drugs” consumes people and money, and resulted in the shooting of a teen-age Texan working on his father’s farm who was mistaken for a drug runner by a Marine who was part of the war on drugs. Thousands of others are dead as a result of this war. Hundreds of thousands are in prison for possession of small amounts. In prison they learn to become expert criminals, which costs us taxpayers.

Three facts dictate that we can never win a war on drugs. These are facts — not feelings or opinions. Drugs tend to trigger hysteria rather than calm and reasonable thinking; think about these facts.

Addiction
First drugs are addictive. They create physical or psychological need for the drug. Once you are hooked, you crave it. It may be crack or cocaine, alcohol or nicotine. How do people respond when they are hooked? Denial of being hooked, because a few people go cold turkey and are able to stop using drugs. Many relapse later. Mark Twain said it is easy to quit smoking; he’d done it a thousand times.

Most people who are addicts crave their drugs until they receive intervention, such as twelve-step programs or medical-psychosocial programs. Most of these approaches depend on the addict admitting their lives are out of control and they want to quit (they stop denial) and a "moral inventory" probes for personal causes.

Supply and demand
The second fact is the law of supply and demand. There is an unending market demand for drugs, because customers are addicted. And the cost will rise when the supply is limited or risky. People who are addicted require their drugs frequently; they must be satisfied at any cost. Frequently.

The war on drugs makes it harder for people to supply drugs, so — supply-and-demand raises the cost. Therefore, addicts often resort to criminal activities to get the money to supply their craving. Are they victims of a misdirected criminal system and of supply-and-demand? Supply-and-demand continually motivates some to develop new drugs to try to catch people to create more demand.

Purity and strength
Purity and safety is the third fact. Alcohol and nicotine are manufactured under controls, so users know it is pure and they know the strength, as 80 proof alcohol. Illegal drugs have neither, which causes many medical problems. Illegal users pass out, go into coma, catch diseases, and die because the drugs are of unknown strength created or diluted in labs that often are not sterile.

To summarize: drugs create addictive craving — a demand that must be supplied at any cost, and purity is irrelevant. That is the present system in the United States and some other nations. There is a far better way that requires a paradigm shift.

Paradigm shift
Since the demand comes from people who are psychologically or medically hooked, change the way we supply the demand. Actually, countless people who were hooked continue to be productive workers and tax payers while their addictive needs are covertly met. And the cost per dose is small. Hard to believe?

Consider the true experience of Dr. William Stewart Halstead (1852–1922). He started the practice of medicine in New York in the 1870s and was soon one of the most promising surgeons. He researched and found that cocaine injected near a nerve was a local anesthesia, which was a major contribution to surgery. But he had tested this on himself first, and became addicted. His medical work suffered, and learning of his addiction, a fellow physician, William Henry Welch, hired a schooner with trusted sailors to sail at sea for months away from cocaine to break the addiction. His skill as a surgeon returned. Dr Welch invited Halstead to join the doctors forming John Hopkins in a minor appointment. However he was such a brilliant surgeon, Halstead became one of the “big four” of John Hopkins Hospital. One of the four, Dr. Osler, knew that his addiction continued though he switched to morphine. Dr. Osler wrote later that Halstead was able to reduce his daily dose to less than three grains, on which “he could do his work comfortably and maintain his excellent physical vigor.”

There are other similar examples, but secret because it is illegal to maintain an addict safely. In England for about fifty years physicians gave addicts the dose they needed. Later this evolved into clinics with careful oversight. Often social workers or others were available to help any addicts who wanted to try to break their addiction. Meanwhile the majority continued working and supporting themselves. A similar program operated in the United States until the Harrison narcotic law of 1914 defined addiction not as a medical problem but a criminal one. Today some addicted people are maintained with the proper dosage of safe drugs at great risk by physician or pharmacist friends as was Dr. Halstead.

For more information and history read Licit and Illicit Drugs by Edward M. Breacher and the editors of Consumer Reports.

If we treated addiction as a psychosocial-medical problem, people now in prison and those on the streets using illegal drugs could receive the dosage necessary for their addiction of safe, appropriate drugs at actual cost, and offered treatment. Meanwhile they could be working and supporting themselves if we provide jobs and training. In our ghettos today dealing drugs is the way to make the most money, and is how many families are supported. What is the cost to us of this underground economy and the high cost per addict and prisoner?

Treatment is the ultimate goal in facing drug addiction and denial. Alcoholics Anonymous and other psychosocial and medical treatments continue to lead to sobriety and recovery for hundreds of thousands. The benefits are far greater than the cost.

When will our legislators recognize the economy in treatment of addiction?

If it is a fact that addicts are addicted, then the law of supply and demand inevitably produces the illegal drug trade with all its results, including impure drugs, unless we treat addicts as addicts. Consider that we treat diabetics and people with many other illnesses by maintenance dosages of what they need for productive and healthy lives, with pure drugs of known strength and proper dosage.

Two final unknowns; once drugs are no longer underground, but open and honestly understood, will the attraction of drugs fade and the number of people newly addicted drop? And if drugs were available from physicians or clinics, with controls, how much criminal activity would stop, since the cost would be much lower that street costs?

So, can a war on drugs ever be won? Or can we treat addicts as people with a medical and psychosocial problem?

One more thought briefly. Our prisons are filled with minority and poor people, mostly male, convicted of possession. Decades ago The Dallas Morning News studied every one tried for murder in Texas over a period of years. They found that the more income an accused murderer had, the higher the chance of not being convicted, and if convicted the lower the sentence, and none sentenced to execution. Since drugs are widely used by higher income people, why are se few in prison compared to minorities and poor?

If you agree, print this to mail to your Representatives state and national.