Pubdate: Thu, 14 Dec 2006 Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON) Copyright: 2006 The Ottawa Citizen Contact: http://www.canada.com/ottawa/ottawacitizen/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/326 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/walters.htm (Walters, John) STRAIGHT TALK ABOUT DRUGS Swinging the blunt hammer of law enforcement on the heads of drug addicts is no solution to a major drug problem, and it's one of the most worrying elements of the federal Conservative government's crime policy. The Tories are planning a meeting with the United States' federal "drug czar," John Walters, sometime in the new year, to co-ordinate policy between our countries. His visit to Canada is now supposed to follow legislation for a crackdown on drug producers and sellers. According to figures released two weeks ago by the U.S. Department of Justice, a record seven million people are imprisoned or on probation or parole in the United States. From 1995 to 2003, nearly half of the growth in the prison population was made up of people imprisoned for drug offences. Spending on drug control goes up every year, and so does the quantity of drugs on the market, according to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy's own figures. Meanwhile, Vancouver's safe drug injection site has been open for three years and is awaiting a decision by Health Minister Tony Clement on whether it can stay open much longer. It provides a clean room where addicts can inject drugs with new syringes and sterile water, in order to prevent the spread of disease. A nurse is on hand and so is at least one addiction counsellor, ready to swing into action if anyone asks for help getting off drugs. A short RCMP memo criticizing the experiment confirms that police officers still don't get it. "The RCMP has concerns regarding any initiative that lowers the perceived risks associated with drug use as there is considerable evidence to show that when the perceived risks associated to drug use decreases, there is a corresponding increase in number of people using drugs," Staff Sgt. Chuck Doucette wrote. In other words, the spread of infectious diseases is a useful tool in the drug war. In fact, the spread of incurable and infectious diseases imposes huge costs on the publicly funded health system, and puts innocent people at risk because the diseases don't confine themselves just to the drug-using population. Drug addiction is bad in itself, but it's a public concern mainly because of these knock-on effects. Peer-reviewed science, summarized in the current Canadian Medical Association Journal, shows that Vancouver's safe injection site has done all anyone could reasonably hope in this regard: reduced the spread of HIV and other illnesses associated with sharing dirty needles; increased the number of addicts going into detox; and reduced the number of overdose deaths. Drug-related crimes such as assaults and petty thefts are neither up nor down, while the number of syringes on the ground and addicts shooting up near the injection site dropped dramatically after it opened. None of the positive results are of much interest to police, whose only objective is to eliminate drug use. The injection site doesn't eliminate drug use, Staff Sgt. Doucette's memo argues, so it's no good. He'd rather spend money on prevention. Prevention is a good investment, but doesn't solve the problem that Vancouver, and Canada, have right now. Short-sighted thinking like this is why we don't give the police too much say in setting drug policy. Stephen Harper's government must not do so. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom