Pubdate: Mon, 28 May 2007
Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA)
Copyright: 2007 San Jose Mercury News
Contact:  http://www.mercurynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/390
Author: Keith Humphreys
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?232 (Chronic Pain)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/heroin.htm (Heroin)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/oxycontin.htm (Oxycontin/Oxycodone)

TRACK MONEY FLOW TO STOP MOVEMENT OF ADDICTIVE DRUGS

The drug dealer of the future is sleek, efficient, sophisticated - 
and WiFi enabled. As highlighted in a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee 
hearing last week, the once-distinct worlds of drug dealing and the 
Internet are merging, resulting in unprecedented access to potent 
painkillers like Vicodin and Oxycontin for non-medical use. The fear 
this situation generates knows no partisan limits: liberal Sen. 
Dianne Feinstein and conservative Sen. Jeff Sessions are reaching 
across the aisle to promote greater controls on Internet drug trafficking.

Addictive and potentially lethal medications are available without 
prescription from over 2 million Web sites around the world, 
according to studies conducted by the Treatment Research Institute at 
the University of Pennsylvania. Many of them are based in countries 
that impose few legal controls on pharmaceuticals. A no-prescription 
pharmacy in Tajikistan or Tanzania - which might be little more than 
a truck with a well-stocked medicine cabinet and a wireless-enabled 
laptop computer - can sell painkillers to Americans with no fear of 
local law enforcement.

This growing phenomenon may be fueling the rising tide of 
prescription drug abuse among adolescents. The 2006 Monitoring the 
Future survey by the University of Michigan found that 12th graders 
are five times as likely to have used Oxycontin and 12 times as 
likely to have used Vicodin as they are to have used heroin in the 
past year. The average parent or teen probably considers abuse of 
these drugs less dangerous than heroin, but in fact they are 
pharmacologically quite similar, all being potent opiates with high 
risk of addiction and overdose.

Tech-Savvy World

Most adolescents are more tech-savvy than their parents, and 
understandably have less fear of ordering a drug on their home 
computer or cell phone than they would of venturing out into the 
street to find a dealer. Many a teenager is home alone when the mail 
comes, and it only takes a few teens to supply a large number of 
young people with Internet-purchased drugs.

What to do? Feinstein and Sessions should be commended for taking the 
important first step of amending the Controlled Substances Act, which 
was originally passed when Steve Jobs and Bill Gates were 15 years 
old, to cover the Internet trade of abusable medications. The next 
step is to develop strategies that limit Internet trade in dangerous 
no-prescription drugs, while preserving the right of patients with 
legitimate prescriptions to purchase needed medications online.

The Drug Enforcement Agency has pursued the traditional law 
enforcement approach of arresting dealers and seizing drugs. This 
works well for pharmacies physically based in the United States, but 
most Web-based drug dealing originates in other countries. Even if we 
were fortunate enough to put all domestic illegal Internet pharmacies 
out of business, the traffic would simply shift entirely overseas at 
the speed of a few mouse clicks. Traditional border control methods 
likewise will have little impact: The Customs Service can't inspect 
more than a fraction of the foreign mail that enters the country each day.

Key Difference

To succeed at suppressing this new form of drug dealing, we will have 
to recognize a fundamental difference between street and Internet 
drug deals. Tracking financial transactions on the street - for 
example, the names and addresses of all the people who contributed to 
the $5,000 in small bills found on an arrested drug dealer - is very 
difficult for law enforcement. In contrast, on the Internet, even the 
smallest financial transactions are electronic, creating a traceable record.

Law enforcement agents could pose as teenagers wanting to buy pain 
killers without prescription over the Internet, much the same way 
they currently catch online sexual predators. Once the phony 
transaction had been processed, the information on the seller could 
be immediately shared with the credit card company and its associated 
bank. These entities, in turn, could cancel the ability of the seller 
to do any further electronic transactions online.  This involves some 
cost for the credit card companies and banks, but it will benefit 
them by getting them out of a dirty business.

Focusing policing on the financial transactions rather than the drugs 
themselves may seem an unusual departure from traditional enforcement 
approaches. But just as the Internet has demanded new ways of 
thinking about every other area of life, it will also require new 
ideas for combating dangerous drugs. Efforts to seize 
Internet-purchased drugs at the border or in far-off nations will 
have minimal effect, but we don't need those familiar tools to tackle 
this problem. The best approach was well-summarized by one of the 
witnesses at the Senate hearing, Dr. Thomas McLellan of the Treatment 
Research Institute: Just follow the money.
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake