Re Andres Oppenheimer's Feb. 19 column, Pro-drug legalization forces gaining clout: There's a middle ground between drug prohibition and blanket legalization. Switzerland's heroin maintenance program has been shown to reduce disease, death and crime among chronic addicts. The success of the program has inspired pilot projects in Canada, Germany, Spain, Denmark and the Netherlands. If expanded, prescription heroin maintenance would deprive organized crime of a core client base and render illegal heroin trafficking unprofitable. Marijuana should be taxed and regulated like alcohol, only without the ubiquitous advertising. As long as organized crime controls marijuana distribution, consumers will come into contact with sellers of hard drugs. Unlike alcohol, marijuana has never been shown to cause an overdose death, nor does it share the addictive properties of tobacco. Marijuana may be relatively harmless, but marijuana prohibition is deadly. Robert Sharpe Policy Analyst Common Sense for Drug Policy Washington, D.C. [end]
After reading the Feb. 1 article DEA: Sharp drop in Florida oxycodone purchases, highlighting the recent drop in Florida pharmacy purchases of oxycodone, I was stuck by the lack of balance and sensitivity toward legitimate patients. As a pharmacist who cares for cancer patients on a daily basis, I'm increasingly concerned that many of the efforts to reduce pill mills in Florida have not only reduced the amount of pain medications available to those trying to abuse and sell them, but it has also reduced the ability for legitimate patients to obtain them. [continues 194 words]
Re: GOP's state prison privatization plan to save $16.5 million yearly! We can do far better than that and save billions by legalizing drugs, just as we did in the 1930s with alcohol! This is a free country which obviously does not forbid people to harm themselves. Imagine what a relief this would bring to the police, the prisons (on-third of all inmates are convicted for drug addiction), and juveniles who no longer would be attracted to the forbidden drugs. [continues 64 words]
A Federal Judge in Miami Will Decide on the Constitutionality of Gov. Rick Scott'S Policy Requiring Random Drug Testing of Thousands of Government Employees. A federal judge in Miami Wednesday cast serious doubts about Gov. Rick Scott's order requiring thousands of state government employees to undergo a random drug test, suggesting his policy "sweeps too broadly." U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro peppered a government lawyer with questions about the constitutionality of Scott's policy, saying she had "trouble understanding the circumstances under which the executive order would be valid." [continues 453 words]
Agency Says CVS and Cardinal Health Knew of Hefty Painkiller Orders The federal government alleges Cardinal Health Inc. and CVS Caremark Corp. were aware of high-volume orders of prescription painkiller oxycodone shipped to two pharmacies in Florida, in a closely watched case probing how much responsibility companies bear for a growing drug-abuse problem. The allegations were made in written declarations filed in federal court earlier this month by the Drug Enforcement Administration. The declarations allege that drug distributor Cardinal repeatedly overlooked escalating oxycodone orders placed by the two Central Florida pharmacies. [continues 1134 words]
For the first time since the United States launched its "war on drugs" four decades ago, there are signs that the forces supporting legalization or de-criminalization of illegal drugs are gaining momentum across the hemisphere. Granted, this is a debate that is just starting at government levels, and that will take years to produce concrete results. But there are several new factors, including a reduction of U.S. anti-narcotic aid to Latin America proposed by the Obama Administration in its 2013 budget announced last week, that are beginning to pose an increasingly serious challenge to the traditional interdiction-based U.S. anti-drug strategies. [continues 647 words]
Federal drug agents and one of the nation's biggest drug distributors are heading for a legal showdown that will test the government's strategy of going after larger corporations to fight rampant prescription drug abuse. The Drug Enforcement Administration moved earlier this month to suspend four pharmacies in Sanford, Fla., from selling controlled substances. The DEA said the four, including two CVS locations, were dispensing "staggering" amounts of oxycodone, a pain medication that has spawned a huge and deadly black market. [continues 1198 words]
Florida lawmakers have once again floated a budget proposal that seeks to cut adult substance-abuse treatment by about 25 percent. If this sounds familiar, it's because the Legislature proposed cuts of about 20 percent in such programs in early 2011 budget talks. Led by Gov. Rick Scott, lawmakers backed off the cuts and kept funding level. Painful cuts were avoided. Lives fractured by the abuse of pills, cocaine and alcohol were likely put back on track. People who could have cost the taxpayers much more -- in prison or in the emergency rooms -- were put on a path to become healthier and more productive. [continues 395 words]
They heard about it at their bridge games, or from the corkboard at the senior center, or through their grandkids who use the Internet. Then they carpooled to Temple Shaarei Shalom in Boynton Beach this recent Sunday afternoon - trios of little old ladies with short white hair and thin sweaters, and wizened men reading the Sun-Sentinel while wearing clunky black shades indoors. Now the 200-plus attendees - most of them seniors - are snacking on mushroom quiche and iced tea while discussing the myriad health benefits of getting high. "I've had a cookie," confesses Natalie, a gregarious, bird-boned 84-year-old woman with a Bronx accent. [continues 1290 words]
This letter is in response to a letter written a few weeks ago by a nurse with chronic pain. Some people have spoken out on the state of Florida's crackdown on the pain mills. As the nurse stated, her doctor will no longer prescribe pain medication, due to the state's knee-jerk reaction. Now any doctor who writes pain medication prescriptions is subject to scrutiny by the state, forcing them to choose between the comfort of their patients or having officials looking at all scripts they have written. Some may choose to let the patient suffer with debilitating pain. [continues 222 words]
Florida's three-year attack on pill mills and rogue doctors has taken a bite out of sales of oxycodone, the prescription drug that turned South Florida into the pain-pill capital of the Southeast. Sales of the narcotic painkiller fell 20 percent last year at Florida pharmacies and other outlets, according to data released this week by the Drug Enforcement Administration. The main reason: Some of the area's biggest pill mill operators and doctors were shut down or arrested, slowing a parade of out-of-state drug dealers and addicts seeking pain drugs, officials said. [continues 634 words]
The Santa Rosa County School District Is Saying "No" to Potpourri. More specifically, the potpourri many refer to as "K-2" or "Spice" that can be smoked, and that gives people the same side affects one might experience while high on marijuana. The drug became mildly popular over the past few years, and the district has taken notice. At Thursday night's school board meeting, the board introduced a proposed amendment for the district's Student Code of Conduct that would outlaw spice as part of a list of controlled substances not allowed on school campuses. [continues 627 words]
A 69-year-old former drug smuggler has launched The Silver Tour to recruit fellow seniors at South Florida retirement communities as advocates for legal medicinal marijuana use. Next tour stop: Temple Shaarei Shalom west of Boynton Beach, where an estimated 300 seniors are expected Sunday. Robert Platshorn, tour organizer and a director of the state chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, believes winning over voting seniors is the answer to legalizing medicinal pot in Florida. [continues 583 words]
The sheen emanating from Donnie Clark's emerald vegetable garden is blinding. There are hulking heads of lettuce, spinach and broccoli -- plants that will not land him in federal prison this time around. Myakka City's most famous folk hero now spends his days puttering around in his backyard plot, sun on his cheeks, dirt under his nails, the weight of the past no longer square on his shoulders. His life has been one of wild adventure, unrelenting mischief, lengthy confinement and abnormal forgiveness, and if he had not been born the son of a Manatee County commissioner 70 years ago then surely an imaginative screenwriter would have invented him. [continues 1751 words]
Racial profiling is understandably a controversial police tactic. Unfortunately, that's what appears to have occurred in Fort Lauderdale's predominantly black, low-income neighborhoods, where young black men were detained and searched after being stopped for walking in streets lacking sidewalks. According to the Broward County Public Defender's Office, the Fort Lauderdale Police Department crossed the line in using an obscure infraction to stop and search people for drugs. The state law is clear: "Where sidewalks are provided, no pedestrian shall, unless required by other circumstances, walk along and upon the portion of a roadway paved for vehicular traffic." [continues 372 words]
Multiple brands of incense that contain synthetic cannabinoids sold at a gas station on Fletcher Avenue. Despite legislative efforts to outlaw them, packets and jars of products such as Spice and K2 can still be bought at most local convenience stores as easily as gum and Gatorade. Products with names like "Red Dragon" and "Blueberry Meditation" contain a blend of herbal plants sprayed with chemical compounds meant to mimic the effects of marijuana. Warnings on the labels state that the smoke should not be inhaled, but more than 9,000 calls were made in the last two years to poison control centers in the U.S. concerning these products, according to a whitehouse.gov fact sheet. [continues 910 words]
TALLAHASSEE -- Tallahassee city commissioners approved a $2.6 million settlement Friday in the wrongful-death suit of a police informant who was fatally shot during a 2008 drug sting. The parents of Rachel Hoffman, 23, sued after her death, claiming police were negligent in setting up the Florida State graduate as an undercover informant after she was caught with marijuana and pills without a prescription. Jury selection for the lawsuit began this week and the trial was scheduled to begin Monday. [continues 412 words]
The iconic D.A.R.E. anti-drug program -- once a fixture in South Florida schools -- is becoming a relic. Fewer students in Palm Beach and Broward counties are parading the once-popular T-shirts and bumper stickers with the slogan "D.A.R.E. to keep kids off drugs." In 2011, only 2,430 students in both counties completed the 10-week course, state records show. That's a sharp drop from 2008, when 6,318 students took part. Police agencies say they don't have enough money to keep teaching the class, which aims to show kids how to handle peer pressure and avoid drugs. Rather, most schools use class time to prepare students for Florida Comprehensive Aptitude Tests, authorities say. Others claim D.A.R.E. is outdated and ineffective. [continues 703 words]
"Play faster!" he cried, wildly, over and over. "Play faster!" The dame who was tickling the ivories complied, out of control herself. The music revved to a dangerous velocity oh, too fast for decent, sober, well-behaved Americans to bear and ... well, you just knew, violence, madness, laughter were just around the corner. The year was 1936 and, oh my God, they were high on marijuana, public enemy No. 1 The scene is from "Reefer Madness," arguably the dumbest movie ever made but smugly at the emotional and ideological core of American drug policy for the last three-quarters of a century. The policy, which morphed in 1970 into an all-out "war" on drugs, has filled our prisons to bursting, created powerful criminal enterprises, launched a real war in Mexico and presided over the skyrocketing of recreational drug use in the United States. The war on drugs just may be a bigger disaster than the war on terror. [continues 719 words]
NAPLES -- The Palmetto Elementary School students bounded to the front of their fifth-grade classroom two-by-two, each coming under friendly questioning from Collier County sheriff's Cpl. Sandra Doria. Cassie Figga, wearing a D.A.R.E. T-shirt and red headband, took the situation in stride. "You're hanging out at Hollywood 20," Doria said. "After the movie, a pack of cigarettes is passed around. What do you say?" "First," Figga said, sizing up the question, "I would tell them that's not a very good idea, and then I'd go tell a manager." [continues 1246 words]
Inside Florida
