CBC -- Tories to appeal prostitution ruling #sextrade

Thursday, September 30, 2010 | | 0 comments

 

By CBC News
CBC News
The federal Conservatives will appeal an Ontario court ruling that struck down key parts of Canada's prostitution laws, Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said Wednesday. "Prostitution is a problem that harms individuals," Nicholson said in question period. "[The government] will appeal and seek a stay of that decision." Tuesday's ruling by...

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Father's incarceration associated with elevated risks of marijuana and other illegal drug use #prison

Wednesday, September 29, 2010 | | 0 comments

 


Father's incarceration associated with elevated risks of marijuana and other illegal drug use
E! Science News
September 29, 2010

Sooner or later, marijuana will be legal #cannabis #drugpolicy

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CNN
September 28, 2010

Sooner or later, marijuana will be legal

By Bill Piper, Special to CNN

Editor's note: Bill Piper is the director of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance.

(CNN) -- It's as predictable as the sun rising and setting. Even though police made more than 850,000 marijuana arrests last year, a recent government report shows youth marijuana use increased by about 9 percent.

Supporters of the failed war on drugs will no doubt argue this increase means policymakers should spend more taxpayer money next year arresting and incarcerating a greater number of Americans. In other words, their solution to failure is to do more of the same. Fortunately, the "reform nothing" club is getting mighty lonely these days -- 76 percent of Americans recognize the drug war has failed; millions are demanding change.

In the almost 40 years since President Nixon declared a war on drugs, tens of millions of Americans have been arrested and hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent. Yet drugs are just as available now as they were then.

It is hard to find even an elected official who hasn't used marijuana or other illegal drugs. President Obama used drugs. Former President George W. Bush made taped comments that many interpreted as indicating he did too. Then there's Bill Clinton, who famously said he smoked pot but didn't inhale. Al Gore, Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin admit they used drugs.

Drug use is so widespread the FBI changed its policy of not hiring people with a history of illegal drug use because the policy disqualified so many people that it could not fill its law enforcement positions.

The war on drugs hasn't just failed; it's created problems of it own. Laws restricting the availability of sterile syringes have increased the spread of AIDS and hepatitis C.

Aggressive campaigns to arrest and incarcerate drug users have increased drug-related deaths by making drug users too afraid to call 911 when a friend is overdosing. The government's misleading and over-the-top anti-drug messages have made young people mistrust other anti-drug messages from parents and adults.

Mass incarceration of drug offenders has drained state and federal resources, distracted police from dealing with violent crime, and produced a generation of children with one or both parents behind bars instead of at home.

The racial disparities are appalling. As Michelle Alexander so eloquently shows in her new book, "The New Jim Crow," a drug conviction automatically makes a person a second-class citizen who can be legally discriminated against in housing and employment, denied school loans, and barred for life from serving on juries, accessing public benefits and even voting.
While African Americans make up only about 13 percent of the U.S.
population and about 15 percent of drug users, they make up about 38 percent of those arrested for drug law violations and a mind-boggling 59 percent of those convicted for drug law violations.

Like Prohibition did for alcohol, drug prohibition is also enriching organized crime. Instead of regulating marijuana to control who can access it, policymakers have ceded control of the $400-billion-a-year global drug market to crime syndicates and thugs.

In Mexico, where parts of the country are like Chicago under Al Capone on steroids, 28,000 people have died since President Calderón launched a war three years ago against well-armed, well-funded drug trafficking organizations. The U.S. government doesn't report its prohibition-related deaths, but law enforcement officers, drug offenders and civilians die every day in our country's war on drugs, too.

It is long past time to abandon the silly notion that America can be a drug-free nation. The inconvenient truth in drug policy is that Americans love drugs -- alcohol, caffeine, marijuana, cocaine, and prescription drugs for everything from anxiety to fatigue. Although some people develop problems with their drug use, most do not. This holds true for both legal drugs like alcohol and tobacco, and illegal drugs like marijuana and cocaine. Decades of evidence shows that the average user of any drug doesn't get addicted and doesn't create problems for anyone else.
Obviously, some do.

We recognize these facts when it comes to legal drugs. It's why we don't arrest the tens of millions of Americans who drink responsibly, but do arrest people who drive while drunk or get belligerent and start fights.
Yet we waste tens of billions of dollars every year arresting Americans for marijuana or other drugs, even when they're not harming anyone. Then we either jam them into overcrowded jails where they take up space that could hold someone who committed a violent offense, or jam them into a treatment program where they take up limited spaces for people who really need help.

What matters most is not how many people use marijuana, alcohol or other drugs, but what's the best way to reduce the problems associated with substance misuse without creating more harmful social problems. Drug use rates rise and fall almost independently of what politicians say and do, but criminalizing drug use makes the situation worse. Prohibition doesn't stop drug use; it makes drug use more dangerous while filling prisons with nonviolent offenders and making crime lords rich. With marijuana use among young people rising despite decades of punitive drug policies, policymakers should reform U.S. drug policy. Or maybe voters will reform it for them.

In November, California voters will vote on Proposition 19, which seeks to control marijuana like alcohol, redirect police resources toward violent criminals, and end California's embarrassingly racist marijuana enforcement once and for all. Polling shows support is about 50-50.

Even if Proposition 19 loses, it will only be temporary. Support for marijuana legalization is growing, and not just in California.
Legalization will happen. It's just a question of how many lives and tax dollars will be wasted before it does. Some vested interests, of course, will fight change until the bitter end. Progress has never been accepted by everyone.

The opinions in this commentary are solely those of Bill Piper.


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New Cato Report #drugpolicy

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---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Friends:

For your information, Cato has just released a new report by Harvard economist Jeff Miron titled "The Budgetary Impact of Ending Drug Prohibition." Since federal and state policymakers are in a financial jam, this report will supply them with information on how they can end a disastrous drug policy and save money to boot. Voting against the drug war remains a risky vote for the politicians (though increasingly less so) but the climate is such that more and more of them are concluding that it is a less painful vote than raising taxes for cutting other things the government spends money on!

Some quick figures: if the drug war ended, taxpayers could save about 88 billion per year (41 from canceled spending and 47 in new tax revenue). If California votes to legalize marijuana, it will improve its financial picture by about one billion per year.

Here is the full study:
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12169

Consider forwarding it to bloggers, local newspaper editorial boards, governors and state legislators -- espec the pols who deal with budget matters.

Thanks

Tim Lynch

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Attachment: http://drugsense.org/temp/MfhGaMHJT619177.html
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The Budgetary Impact of Ending Drug Prohibition #drugpolicy

Tuesday, September 28, 2010 | | 0 comments

The Budgetary Impact of Ending Drug Prohibition

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
New White Paper by Jeffrey Miron and Katherine Waldock

Full PDF can be downloaded here:

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12169

State and federal governments in the United States face massive looming fiscal deficits. One policy change that can reduce deficits is ending the drug war. Legalization means reduced expenditure on enforcement and an increase in tax revenue from legalized sales.

This report estimates that legalizing drugs would save roughly $41.3 billion per year in government expenditure on enforcement of prohibition. Of these savings, $25.7 billion would accrue to state and local governments, while $15.6 billion would accrue to the federal government.

Approximately $8.7 billion of the savings would result from legalization of marijuana and $32.6 billion from legalization of other drugs.

The report also estimates that drug legalization would yield tax revenue of $46.7 billion annually, assuming legal drugs were taxed at rates comparable to those on alcohol and tobacco. Approximately $8.7 billion of this revenue would result from legalization of marijuana and $38.0 billion from legalization of other drugs.

-Rielle

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Prosecutor argues against pot law challenge #cannabis

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Prosecutor argues against pot law challenge
FIONA ISAACSON
Peterborough Examiner
September 28, 2010

Ontario Sex Work Decision- Press Conference Sept. 28th #sextrade

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Ontario court to rule on adult prostitution laws
Press conference Tuesday September 28th at Interurban Gallery
Click here to add your email copy and images.
Media Advisory- for immediate release

The Ontario Superior Court’s final decision on the 2007 Sex Professional of Canada’s Charter challenge of Canada’s prostitution laws will be released tomorrow, September 28. FIRST and Pivot will be hosting a media conference to discuss the impact of the Ontario court decision on sex workers.

The case, brought by three Ontario sex workers, challenges the following Criminal Code sections: 210 - bawdy house; Section 213(1) – communicating for the purposes of prostitution; and Section 212(1)(j) - living off the avails of prostitution.


What: Press conference- Ontario court decision on the laws relating to adult prostitution 
When: Tuesday, September 28th - 1pm
Where: Interurban Gallery - 1 East Hastings Street (at Caroll), Vancouver BC

Speakers:
Katrina Pacey- Pivot Legal Society
Jen Allen-  Jen’s Kitchen
Kerry Porth-  PACE
Susan Davis panel- BC Coalition of Experiential Communities
 

 
For more information, contact: 
Esther Shannon       604-254-9963
Joyce Arthur            604-351-0867




Pivot’s mandate is to take a strategic approach to social change, using the law to address the root causes that undermine the quality of life of those most on the margins. We believe that everyone, regardless of income, benefits from a healthy and inclusive community where values such as opportunity, respect and equality are strongly rooted in the law.

Unsubscribe kpacey@pivotlegal.org from this list.

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Twitter feeds and blogs tell hidden story of Mexico's drug wars #mexico #drugpolicy

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The Guardian
26 september, 2010

Twitter feeds and blogs tell hidden story of Mexico's drug wars

A small army of bloggers and tweeters is filling the gaps left by traditional media in Mexico that are increasingly limiting their coverage of the country's drug wars because of pressure from the cartels.

"Shots fired by the river, unknown number of dead," read one recent tweet on a busy feed from the northern border city of Reynosa, #Reynosafollow. "Organized crime blockade on San Fernando road lifted,"
said another. "Just saw police officers telling a group of narcos about the positions of navy checkpoints," ran a third.

Nothing of this kind appeared in the city's papers which, along with most media outlets in the north-eastern state of Tamaulipas, have become better known for what they do not publish than for what they do.

Tamaulipas is one of the most intense battlegrounds of the drug wars being fought in Mexico between the federal forces and at least seven cartels.

Gun fights lasting hours, grenade attacks in shopping streets, military swoops on suspected kingpins - all ignored. Six local journalists in one city disappeared in two days, and there was hardly a word from their terrified colleagues.

One editor on a regional paper - who does not want to be named for security reasons - has meticulously followed directives from the dominant local traffickers ever since a story she published about a shoot-out, based on an official report, earned her a death threat a couple of months ago.

She does not even dare complain too openly about this to colleagues, in case they are in the pay of the gang. But every now and then she cannot resist tweeting. "Sometimes the emotion of a story gets to me and I put it on Twitter," she says. "Especially when I know it won't get out otherwise."

Earlier this month, she revealed the kidnapping of a former local mayor who is also a cousin of Mexico's biggest media magnate.

This reporting is not just the preserve of citizen journalists and frustrated reporters, all too aware that at least 30 Mexican journalists have been killed or disappeared since the drug wars began in December 2006. There are also plenty of rumourmongers, official sources, and cartel propagandists.

El Blog del Narco was set up in March and posts the information, photographs and videos it receives unedited and without comment.

The result is a catalogue of horror absent even from the national press, which still covers the violence from the relative safety of its headquarters in the capital.

Offerings last week included a video of the interrogation and execution of four alleged hit men, photographs of a car found in a Pacific coast resort with two heads on the roof - the headless bodies were on the back seat - and the army's discovery of a torture house about an hour's drive from Mexico City. Much of the material comes from the cartels themselves, but in an email interview with the Guardian, the anonymous administrator insisted he has no direct relationship with them.

"We just publish the information," he wrote, adding that the blog sometimes receives 4m visits a week.

"Blog del Narco grew because the media and the government are trying to pretend that nothing is happening in Mexico."

This is not quite true. At least not yet. Although regional media in all the hot spots are resorting to some degree of self-censorship, the extent varies from front to front.

Journalists in the infamously violent border city of Ciudad Juárez have long ago reduced their investigations, but they still cover the daily murders and massacres in detail.

Some say the unusually high number of outlets in Juárez are just too hard to control, others point out that the city's warriors are often happy to publicise their crimes. But many wonder whether the rules of the game are now changing even in Juárez.

The city's biggest paper, the Diario de Juárez, responded to the recent murder of one of its photographers with a front page editorial appealing to organised crime for advice on how to avoid more deaths among its staff.

"We need you to explain to us what you want us to publish and what not,"
it said.

If the answer turns out to be silence, the experience elsewhere in Mexico suggests there will be plenty of twitter feeds and blogs ready to occupy the information vacuum they leave behind.

--
Drugs & Democracy Info <drugs@tni.org>
Transnational Institute (TNI)
De Wittenstraat 25 1052 AK
P.O.Box 14656 1001 LD
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Vancouver's supervised injection facility challenges drug laws - CMAJ - 2010 #supervised injection facilities

Monday, September 27, 2010 | | 0 comments

See attached
 

drugs and gangs in the news

| | 0 comments

 

Metro Vancouver gangsters export drug war to Prince George
Neighbourhood in Northern B.C. city ripped apart by gang violence
By Kim Bolan
Vancouver Sun
September 25, 2010

Women being pushed to their deaths by drug dealers, say Downtown Eastside advocates
'They're playing with their lives,' says community worker
By Suzanne Fournier
The Province
September 24, 2010

A New Mafia: Crime families ruling Toronto, Italy alleges
By Adrian Humphreys
National Post
September 24, 2010

Twitter feeds and blogs tell hidden story of Mexico's drug wars
By Jo Tuckman
Guardian (UK)
September 26, 2010

France mulls opening 'shooting galleries' for drug addicts #supervisedinjection

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Subject: FR: France mulls opening 'shooting galleries' for drug addicts

France 24
www.france24.com
24 September 2010

France mulls opening 'shooting galleries' for drug addicts

French officials across the political spectrum have expressed support for "shooting galleries", where addicts could use drugs under medical supervision. Such centres exist in several other European countries.

By Guillaume LOIRET

The debate over "shooting galleries" started in the headquarters of an anti-addiction association located in the Belleville neighbourhood of Paris. In May 2009, the association, called ASUD (Self-support and Risk Reduction among Drug Users) opened a centre in which addicts could use drugs under medical supervision, much like the centres that exist already in the Netherlands or Switzerland.

The purpose, according to Pierre Chappard, who works for the association, is to "get the message to the political class" that such places have distinct benefits -- namely fighting "fantasies and fears"
of those who consider "shooting galleries" an encouragement to take drugs.

Various associations and politicians began examining the issue, soliciting the opinions of experts, and visiting "shooting galleries" in Spain and Switzerland. One association, ESPT, made up of local elected officials focused on health issues, concluded that such places might be a good idea in France

French drug users go to Geneva

Patrick Padovani is a Marseille official from the centre-right UMP party, and a member of ESPT. Last week, he visited a "shooting gallery"
in Geneva called Quai 9. "When we visited, we discovered a third of the French addicts had crossed the border into Switzerland to come to this centre", he said in an interview with France24.com. "And they don't understand why this kind of place doesn't exist in France!"

In Geneva, Padovani, who is a doctor, discovered that the "shooting gallery" actually felt more like a "welcome centre". He described the centre as "very open, lively, well set-up". The drug addicts, who come to the centre between 11 am and 7 pm, are particularly appreciative of "the presence of a medical team, so that they only shoot up with a doctor nearby, and of the opportunity to find a place in which they can interact with others".

Canadian scientists who studied a centre for drug use in Vancouver concluded that regular attendance of a "shooting gallery" could in fact help an addict break the addiction. Since the centre opened, requests for rehabilitation have surged by 30%. The Canadian study, published in 2010 in the journal "Drug and Alcohol Dependence", also showed that drug-related crime, the spread of HIV, and overdoses are on the decline since the centre was created.

Elected officials intrigued

On Friday, ESPT presents its conclusions following six months of investigating "shooting galleries". The press release published on Friday stated that "centres for drug use constitute a tool for improvement in the sanitary and social conditions encountered by the most endangered and alienated drug users".

The officials who belong to the association represent both right-wing and left-wing French political parties, and have proposed trying out "shooting galleries" in France for at least three reasons: the centres would be the logical next step in initiatives that already exist, like needle exchanges and substitution treatments; they help reduce health risks, like overdose and infection; and they facilitate the re-integration of addicts into society.

The officials have asked public authorities to take a series of steps, such as drafting a map that would show areas in France where uncontrolled drug use is most rampant, as well as asking police and other legal officials to collaborate on the project.

But the subject has become a thorny one because of divisions within the government. Though Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot has been receptive to the idea, Prime Minister François Fillon has said "The establishment of drug-use clinics is neither useful nor desirable in France".

Meanwhile, Philippe Meunier, a right-wing deputy from the Rhone region, reacted Friday with a dose of sarcasm: "Why not also give them drugs and call the Medellin cartel to get a better deal?" he said, adding that opening centres for drug use would be "an easy solution, a decision to give up". In a phone interview with France24.com, Meunier said he feared the logic behind opening "shooting galleries" would lead to the "legalisation of drug use".

'People are not ready'

In Europe, roughly 40 big cities have opened "shooting galleries" with medical supervision. Most of those cities were confronting serious drug-use problems, and the local populations learned to accept the existence of the centres. "That's the most complicated part: explaining it and making people accept it", assessed Marie-Odile Dufour, an official in charge of health policy from a town outside Paris. "Public opinion is not ready". In Champigny, where Dufour lives, a local methadone treatment centre for heroin addicts was not easy for residents to accept. "It will take time", Dufour said.

But those in favour of "shooting galleries" think those grievances are beside the point. As Patrick Padovani, the official from Marseille,
said: "Sometimes one shouldn't wait for public opinion to be ready".


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Transnational Institute (TNI)
De Wittenstraat 25 | 1052 AK Amsterdam (The Netherlands) Tel +31-20-6626608 | Fax +31-20-6757176 http://www.tni.org/drugs http://www.druglawreform.info/ http://www.ungassondrugs.org/
Twitter: @DrugLawReform
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Marijuana legalization measure gets big lift #cannabis

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San Francisco Chronicle
Sunday, September 26, 2010

Marijuana legalization measure gets big lift

John Wildermuth, Chronicle Staff Writer

In a dramatic shift of sentiment, nearly half of California's likely voters now want to legalize marijuana use in the state, according to a new Field Poll.

"The numbers have flipped (on Proposition 19) since our July poll," said Mark DiCamillo, the poll's director. "That's a major change in the direction of public feelings on legalizing marijuana."

The survey results being released today are especially meaningful since the first ballots for the Nov. 2 election will be cast in a little more than a week from now, starting Oct. 4.

The poll also found that voters remain strongly opposed to Proposition 23, which would suspend AB32, the state law limiting greenhouse gas emissions. Proposition 25, which would end the two-thirds requirement to pass a state budget, holds a solid lead, but the race appears to be rapidly tightening.

But it's California's effort to become the first state in the nation to legalize the sale and use of recreational marijuana for adults 21 and older that's being watched across the country.

Forty-nine percent of those likely voters now support Prop. 19, with 42 percent opposed. In a July poll, 48 percent of those surveyed planned to vote against the ballot initiative, with 44 percent backing legalization.

The reversal came despite a total absence of paid advertising for either side. Neither supporters nor opponents of the measure have raised much money for the Prop. 19 campaign, so far relying on word-of-mouth and media coverage to get their stories out.

That hasn't kept California voters from paying attention to the race, however. The poll found that 84 percent had seen or heard about the effort to legalize marijuana. By contrast, fewer than 40 percent of the voters had heard anything about the other two ballot measures in the survey.

Nine percent of voters are undecided on Prop. 19, which DiCamillo said isn't much of a surprise.

"Everyone knows about it, and it isn't that complicated an issue," he added.

For supporters, the bump in the numbers shows that their message is getting through.

"Police, sheriffs and judges have been speaking out recently in support of Prop. 19's commonsense solution to control and tax marijuana like alcohol and tobacco - to allow police to focus on violent crime," said Dan Newman, a spokesman for the Yes on 19 campaign.

Opponents of the measure, who include a number of law-enforcement figures, are confident the numbers will change.

"Obviously, this is a volatile electorate, but that doesn't change the fact that no poll has shown (legalization supporters) with the 50 percent they need to win," said Roger Salazar, a spokesman for the No on
19 effort.

In 1996, California voters legalized the use of medical marijuana, passing Prop. 215 with nearly 56 percent of the vote. A 1972 effort to legalize marijuana in the state, also Prop. 19, was steamrolled, collecting only a third of the votes.

More than 40 years of polling by Field shows just how dramatic the shift on marijuana has been. In 1969, just 13 percent of California adults wanted to legalize marijuana, while 49 percent called on the state to pass new, tougher laws against the drug.

By 1983, 30 percent of registered voters favored legalization, but 32 percent still wanted to crack down on users.

Now close to 50 percent of registered voters want marijuana legalized and only 14 percent want harsher laws.

Men and women have very different views of Prop. 19, as do the young and the old. While 54 percent of men back legalization, only 44 percent of women support Prop. 19. Nearly 60 percent of the youngest voters, those under 40, want to see marijuana made legal. Fifty-three percent of those
65 and older oppose it.

"With a lot of people considering and reconsidering ... this is probably not as solid a 49 percent (support) as can be," DiCamillo said. "Turnout matters a great deal, and if the young voters don't turn out, it could make a big difference."

Support for Prop. 19 also breaks along geographic and political lines, with the heavily Democrat coastal counties 54 percent in favor while the more Republican inland areas are 52 percent opposed. Not surprisingly, the measure's strongest support comes from the Bay Area and Los Angeles County, where just under 60 percent favor legalization.

More than 60 percent of Democrats and decline-to-state voters plan to vote for Prop. 19.

A Field survey taken in July found that 60 percent of Bay Area registered voters said they had used marijuana, far above the 47 percent state average. Slightly more than half the state's men reported using the drug, compared with 43 percent of women.

The poll found little movement surrounding Prop. 23, even though it's becoming a major battleground in the races for governor and U.S. Senate.
While the 45 percent who oppose suspending the greenhouse gas rules dropped from July's 48 percent, support for the initiative also slipped from 36 percent in July to 34 percent in the newest poll. More than a fifth of voters now are undecided.

Support for the Democrat-backed Prop. 25 has skidded dramatically since July, when it was supported by 65 percent of the voters. The new poll has proponents of the measure with a 46 to 30 percent lead, but more tightening is likely, DiCamillo said.

The July poll had 58 percent of Republicans supporting the change, which party leaders argue will allow Democrats to pass a state budget without any GOP votes. In the new poll, Republican support has dropped to 30 percent, with another 30 percent undecided.

"This is a measure that is still in flux, and you can't really tell where it will end up," DiCamillo said. "Republican voters are in transition ... as they try to decide who the winners and losers will be."

The poll is based on a telephone survey taken from Sept. 14-21 of 857 registered voters, including 599 identified as likely to vote in November. The margin of error based on the sample is plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.

E-mail John Wildermuth at jwildermuth@sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page A - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/09/26/MNC21FJMOQ.DTL&ao=2#ixzz10jJGMPxc

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Snuff out pot measure #drugpolicy #cannabis

Friday, September 24, 2010 | | 0 comments

Los Angeles Times
September 24, 2010

Snuff out pot measure

Proposition 19 is poorly thought out, badly crafted and replete with loopholes and contradictions.

Marijuana is the most popular illegal drug in the United States. Seventy years of criminal prohibition, "Just Say No" sloganeering and a federal drug war that now incarcerates 225,000 people a year have not diminished the availability or use of - or apparently the craving for - cannabis.
And helping meet the demand is California, the nation's top grower.
Marijuana production here results in an estimated $14 billion in sales, and its cultivation and distribution are now tightly woven into the state's economy. It is grown in homes, in backyards and even in national parks, including Yosemite.

Marijuana is popular, plentiful and lucrative, costing about $400 a pound to grow and yielding $6,000 a pound on the street. So it is perhaps inevitable that an attempt would be made to legalize it, as Proposition 19 - the Regulate, Control and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010 - purports to do. The act would authorize possession of one ounce of marijuana for personal consumption by people 21 and older, permit marijuana use in private residences or public places licensed for on-site consumption, and allow marijuana cultivation in private residences for personal use. It includes strong restrictions regarding the sale or use of marijuana to or around minors, and would permit city and county governments to regulate and tax it. Proponents of the proposition say it would bring public policy on marijuana into line with that on alcohol and cigarettes, both of which can be dangerous and deadly but are nonetheless legal. It is the criminalization of the drug that creates social problems, they say, including a violent drug war at the border, fueled in part by black-market profits, and millions of lives damaged by overzealous enforcement rather than by the drug itself.

The proposal has riveted national attention on California, as did Proposition 215, the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, which permitted the medicinal use of marijuana. Thirteen states have since adopted similar measures, and public approval for medical marijuana has increased significantly. Californians' independent streak and willingness to challenge federal authority have galvanized the national debate on legalization. The question now is whether we will do it again. Will we thumb our noses at Washington and blaze another new trail?

We should not.

Whether marijuana should be legal is a valid subject for discussion.
Californians ought to welcome a debate about whether marijuana is any more dangerous than alcohol, whether legalization would or would not increase consumption, and whether crime would go down as a result of decriminalization. But Proposition 19 is so poorly thought out, badly crafted and replete with loopholes and contradictions that it offers an unstable platform on which to base such a weighty conversation.

Its flaws begin with the misleading title: Regulate, Control and Tax Act. Those are hefty words that suggest responsibility and order. But the proposition is in fact an invitation to chaos. It would permit each of California's 478 cities and 58 counties to create local regulations regarding the cultivation, possession and distribution of marijuana. In other words, the law could change hundreds of times from county to county. In Los Angeles County alone it could mean 88 different sets of regulations.

The proposition would have merited more serious consideration had it created a statewide regulatory framework for local governments, residents and businesses. But it still would have contained a fatal
flaw: Californians cannot legalize marijuana. Regardless of how the vote goes on Nov. 2, under federal law marijuana will remain a Schedule I drug, whose use for any reason is proscribed by Congress. Sure, California could go it alone, but that would set up an inevitable conflict with the federal government that might not end well for the state. That experiment has been tried with medical marijuana, and the outcome has not inspired confidence. Up and down the state, an untold number of residents have faced federal prosecution for actions that were allowed under California law. It's true that the Obama administration has adopted a more tolerant position on state laws regulating medical marijuana, but there's no guarantee that the next administration will.
Regardless, Obama's "drug czar," Gil Kerlikowske, has firmly stated that the administration will not condone marijuana's legalization for recreational purposes.

One reason given by Proposition 19 supporters for legalizing marijuana is that California is in dire fiscal straits, and taxing the cannabis crop could ultimately enrich state and local coffers by $1.4 billion a year. But again, critics say that argument is misleading. The act essentially requires local governments that choose to regulate and tax marijuana to establish new bureaucracies and departments, and much of the new revenue could be eaten up by the cumbersome process of permitting and licensing sales, consumption, cultivation and transportation.

Far from helping the state's economic outlook, Proposition 19 could cause substantial harm. For instance, it would put employers in a quandary by creating a protected class of on-the-job smokers, bestowing a legal right to use marijuana at work unless employers could actually prove that it would impair an employee's job performance. Employers would no longer have the right to screen for marijuana use or discipline a worker for being high. But common sense dictates that a drug-free environment is crucial at too many workplaces to name - schools, hospitals, emergency response and public safety agencies, among others.

The multiple conflicts with federal law, and the strong probability of confusing and contradictory municipal laws that would result from its passage, overwhelm the hypothetical benefits of Proposition 19.

This is the first of The Times' endorsements in the Nov. 2 election.
Upon publication, they will be collected at latimes.com/opinion.
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Heroin maintenance for chronic heroin-dependent individuals. #heroinmaintenance

Thursday, September 23, 2010 | | 0 comments

Subject: GEN: Heroin maintenance for chronic heroin-dependent individuals.

Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews: 2010, Issue 8.
Art. No.: CD003410. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD003410.pub3.
22 September 2010

Heroin maintenance for chronic heroin-dependent individuals.

Ferri M., Davoli M., Perucci C.A.

For the first time an authoritative review has combined results from all the trials to date of long-term heroin prescribing for the management of heroin addiction. Its analyses reveal several significant or probably significant advantages for patients previously failed by methadone.

Abstract

Prescribing heroin for the treatment of heroin addiction is today generally seen as a 'rescue' option for patients who have not benefited sufficiently from methadone maintenance. This updated review and meta-analysis A study which uses recognised procedures to summarise quantitative results from several studies of the same or similar interventions to arrive at composite outcome scores. Usually undertaken to allow the intervention's effectiveness to be assessed with greater confidence than on the basis of the studies taken individually. from the respected Cochrane collaboration adds new studies of the treatment from England, Spain and Canada, supplementing the earlier British, German, Swiss and pair of Dutch studies. The aim was to integrate findings on injectable (or in one case, smokable) 'heroin maintenance' as compared to more conventional oral methadone treatment, but also to any other comparators available in the literature, without limiting the selection to trials which allocated patients at random. In the event, seven of the eight relevant studies did explicitly compare heroin maintenance Often supplemented by oral methadone to help bridge time gaps (heroin has a much shorter duration of action) and to ease the burden of having to attend the clinic three times a day to inject heroin under medical supervision. to oral methadone; the remaining study also effectively did so, since all but a few of the control group A group of people, households, organisations, communities or other units who do not participate in the intervention(s) being evaluated. Instead, they receive no intervention or none relevant to the outcomes being assessed, carry on as usual, or receive an alternative intervention (for the latter the term comparison group may be preferable). Outcome measures taken from the controls form the benchmark against which changes in the intervention group(s) are compared to determine whether the intervention had an impact and whether this is statistically significant.
Comparability between control and intervention groups is essential.
Normally this is best achieved by randomly allocating research participants to the different groups. Alternatives include sequentially selecting participants for one then the other group(s), or deliberately selecting similar set of participants for each group. patients who had to find other sources of help in fact enrolled in methadone programmes.
The review assumed that all patients were chronic heroin addicts since only these patients would qualify for such treatments. Studies typically recruited local addicts who had regularly used illicit heroin for several years and who had not done well in previous non-heroin based treatments.

Main findings

Over the periods of the eight studies, for every 100 patients retained in treatment on methadone, another 23 were retained on heroin, almost a statistically significant advantage (ie, unlikely to have happened by chance). In the Dutch studies heroin patients faced stricter disciplinary discharge rules than methadone patients, biasing the retention rates. Leaving these studies out, heroin's advantage rises to another 43 patients and becomes statistically significant. Similar results are found if the analysis is restricted to the more recent (and more tightly controlled) studies.

Across the five studies to report this, for every 100 patients prescribed methadone who relapsed to use of illicit heroin, just 70 did so when prescribed heroin, very nearly a statistically significant advantage. Three studies also documented use of other substances; here there was a statistically significant advantage for prescribed heroin, the ratio being 100 on methadone to just 63 on heroin.

Across the six studies which reported on patient deaths, there were so few that the relative safety of heroin- and methadone-based treatments could not be assessed. Slightly fewer (0.9 in every 100 patients versus
1.2) heroin patients died, but on the other hand, significantly more adverse medical events short of death were recorded among the same patients - an extra 61%.

A 20% reduction in self-reported criminal activity among heroin compared to methadone patients just failed to reach statistical significance.
However, a significant extra reduction in average days involved in crime per month recorded in the Spanish study could not be incorporated in the calculations because this measure was incompatible with those of the other studies. Just two studies reported on imprisonment, of which the German trial was the only one to have tested modern-day treatments. In this study the numbers imprisoned were significantly and substantially fewer (a near halving) on heroin compared to methadone. Convictions too were fewer in the first 12 months of the study; 50% of heroin patients were convicted compared to 66% of methadone patients. In the studies reporting these outcomes, employment rates and improvements in family relationships did not significantly differ between heroin and non-heroin patients; possibly the need to attend the clinic to take prescribed heroin two or three times a day counteracted the expected gains.

The reviewers' conclusions

The available results demonstrate limited statistically significant positive effects of heroin (plus flexible dosing with methadone) with regard to most of the outcomes considered. Results are consistent across studies except (as explained above) for the Dutch studies which recorded better retention in the control group. All the authors of the studies highlighted the risks of adverse events. This risk warrants the provision of heroin only to patients who have clearly been failed by methadone treatment and only in centres equipped to respond to emergencies. What counts as 'failure' in this context remains to be clearly delineated. Certain disadvantages including poverty, lack of family support, and psychiatric problems are associated with poor compliance and response to many kinds of medical treatments. Since everywhere resources are limited, the open question is whether it is advisable to allocate patients to more expensive medications like heroin, rather than trying to address more effectively the identified health and social predictors of non-compliance and relapse which prevent methadone treatment working as well as it might. Given the higher rate of serious adverse events, the risk-benefit balance of heroin prescription should carefully be evaluated before the treatment is implemented in clinical practice. Heroin prescription should remain a treatment of last resort for people failed by conventional maintenance treatment. The capacity of addiction services and whether the treatment can be afforded in the long term should carefully be assessed beforehand.

Findings

The very cautious conclusion reached by the reviewers might easily have been more positive with some justifiable adjustments to the pool of studies included in the analyses or if the included outcomes had been only a fraction different. In particular, the early British trial could justifiably have been considered a trial of such a different kind There was no supervised consumption of heroin at the clinic, doses were low, and there was no requirement that patients had to have been failed by prior methadone treatment. of heroin-based treatment that it could have been analysed separately. Give such adjustments, In this case omitting the Dutch trials which had stricter disciplinary discharge rules for heroin patients. the advantage in retention became statistically significant and quite substantial - important because substitute prescribing treatments tend to be like an on-off switch; while patients remain in treatment they quickly improve and most do relatively well, but a rapid reversion to regular illicit heroin use with all its consequences is common if they drop out or are forced out of treatment.

Similarly, omitting the early English trial might have led the nearly significant heroin relapse comparison to have become statistically significant. Results for other substances were significant without adjustment. The death toll could not have been expected to be significantly different but still favoured heroin and would have done so more clearly had the early English trial been separated out. The higher incidence of adverse effects recorded among heroin patients may largely have been due to the fact their injecting - and any resultant immediate complications - were observed by the clinics, while any injecting by methadone patients would not have been. Had results from the Spanish trial been able to be included in the analysis, then the near significant extra reduction in crime among heroin patients may also have crossed the threshold to statistical significance.

For Britain the RIOTT trial conducted at clinics in London, Darlington, and Brighton between 2005 and 2008 is the vital study. The questions posed by the study were whether patients who remained wedded to street heroin despite extensive treatment were simply beyond available treatments, whether it was just that their current oral treatment programmes were sub-optimal, or whether they would only do well if prescribed injectable medications. Each of these three propositions was true for some of the patients. A third did seem beyond current treatments even as extended and optimised by the study. For a fifth, 'all' it took was to individualise and optimise dosing and perhaps also psychosocial support and treatment planning in a continuing oral methadone programme. But despite pulling out many stops to make the most of oral methadone, nearly half the patients only did well if prescribed injectable medications, with heroin by far the better option than methadone at suppressing illegal heroin use. The upshot was that the most reliable option in terms of securing a divorce from regular illegal heroin injecting was to prescribe the same drug to be taken in the same way, but legally and under medical supervision. As defined by the study, two-thirds of these seemingly intractable patients responded well to this option. However, from a conference presentation it seems injectable medications and heroin in particular had a far less clear-cut advantage in respect of crime, health, and quality of life.

Conclusions similar to those reached by the featured review have been reflected in UK national clinical guidelines and in guidance issued by England's National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse. In particular the latter is clear that injectable prescribing should be considered only for the minority of patients with persistently poor outcomes despite optimised oral programmes, and that the priority should be improving the effectiveness of oral maintenance treatment for the majority.

Apart from the obvious and serious issue of cost, there is in any event a major logistical problem in extending heroin prescribing programmes based as recommended on supervised consumption at the clinic. Studies in continental Europe and Britain have shown that requiring on-site injecting or smoking of heroin several times a day is feasible. However, this can only work for patients who can easily and quickly get to the clinic. Unless the network of heroin prescribing centres is greatly expanded, on-site consumption will leave large parts of Britain unserved, especially rural areas. The inconvenience of on-site consumption can be tempered by allowing patients to skip visits and take oral medication instead, an opportunity most took advantage of in Swiss trials. Insisting instead on the return of used ampoules - a tactic used with seeming success in a study in London - may be a less intrusive and less expensive way to prevent diversion.

For more on substitute prescribing for heroin addiction see this Findings hot topic. For heroin prescribing studies in particular run this search on the Findings site, and especially see this Findings review and a later review which paid careful attention to the context of the studies and the details of the treatments.


This draft entry is currently subject to consultation and correction by the study authors and other experts.
Last revised 22 September 2010

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD003410.pub3

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September 2010 Update from the Canadian Drug Policy Consortium

Wednesday, September 22, 2010 | | 0 comments

 

Dear members of the Canadian Drug Policy Consortium,

We are pleased to provide you with an update of our recent activities, to keep you informed about what the CDPC has been working toward. We are also calling for your action on a few items below.

The Interim Governing Council has been busy working on funding proposals. See details below. Once we receive funding, one of our first activities will be to reach out to all of you to convene the Governing Council and launch the CDPC’s structure and work program.

Meanwhile, members of the Interim Governing Council of CDPC have been active in Canadian and International drug policy events including:

·         In November of 2009 several CDPC members attended the International Drug Policy Conference hosted by the US organization Drug Policy Alliance in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where one of the founding members of CDPC, Donald MacPherson,  received a major award, the Richard J. Dennis Drug Peace Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Drug Policy Reform. CDPC representatives met with officials from the Open Society Institute’s Global Drug Policy Fund to discuss funding for international activities.

·         In December of 2009 CDPC had a representative attend a drug policy dialogue in Amsterdam hosted by the Transnational Institute, the Andreas Papandreou Foundation, the Ministry of Public Health, Welfare and Sports and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands. CDPC met with officials from the International Drug Policy Consortium to discuss potential organizational models and how CDPC can be connected to this organization.

·         In December of 2009 a CDPC representative testified before the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs regarding concerns about the proposed Bill C-15, An Acto to Amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and to Make Consequential Amendments to Other Acts.

·         In March of 2010, CDPC was represented at the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna.

·         In April a representative of CDPC presented at the International Harm Reduction Conference in Liverpool, UK.

·         In June, CDPC attended the Net Change Conference in Toronto that looks at the intersection between social media and technology and social change.

·         Also in June representatives of CDPC attended the Canadian HIV Legal Network Symposium in Toronto.

·         CDPC is also working directly with the International Centre for Science in Drug Policy (http://www.icsdp.org/) to develop a program of knowledge translation to inform public education and dialogue events that CDPC will be organizing in 2011.

·         In July of 2010, members of CDPC attended the International AIDS Conference in Vienna. Global Drug Policy was one of the major themes this year and the Vienna Declaration calling for the end of the War on Drugs was the main document coming out of the conference. Over 12,500 individuals and organizations have signed the Vienna Declaration since its launch in early July. The CDPC has signed on to the declaration. During the conference CDPC members met with the Open Society Institute (OSI) Global Drug Policy Fund Director, Kasia Malinowska-Sempruch who invited us to submit a funding proposal to OSI by September 15th.

·         CDPC was also invited to submit a proposal for funding to the MAC AIDS Fund. Funding from the OSI and the MAC AIDS Fund will enable CDPC to staff a few key positions and officially launch the organization so that it may be in an even better position to work on drug policy issues. Once the positions are filled, a more formal membership process will be launched.

·         CDPC will be represented at the Canadian Students for Sensible Drug Policy conference in Toronto November 5-7

·         CDPC will also be represented at the 8th National Harm Reduction Conference in the US November 18-21st 

·         CDPC has endorsed the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network’s letter to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights and the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs expressing concern about the federal government’s modified mandatory minimum sentencing, Bill S-10: An Act To Amend The Controlled Drugs And Substances Act And To Make Related And Consequential Amendments To Other Acts. We will follow this issue closely.

Call for Action

·         If you have not done so already, please consider signing the Vienna Declaration at www.viennadeclaration.com

We trust that this brief summary of CDPC activities provides you with an overview of our commitment to improving drug policy. Look for more updates in the near future!

Sincerely,

The CDPC Interim Governing Council:

Donald MacPherson

Dan Reist

Walter Cavalieri

Gillian Maxwell

Lynne Belle-Isle




2 films from HCLU #drugpolicy #films

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Dear Colleagues,

for those of you who have not seen them yet I would like to call your attention to HCLU's two new movies. 

The first film features the International Network of People Who Use Drugs (INPD), the first global network that represents people who use drugs in international agencies and aims to defend their human rights:


We made the other movie to support activists from all over the world in the campaign to fully fund the Global Fund: 


For further information and to sign-on the letter Fully Finance the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria go to 


Best regards,  

Peter Sarosi
Drug Policy Program Director
Hungarian Civil Liberties Union
Tel.: +36 1 279 2236
P please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to.

A chance for a scientific drugs policy #drugpolicy

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The Guardian (UK)
guardian.co.uk
Tuesday 21 September 2010

A chance for a scientific drugs policy

There's a growing recognition that Labour's incoherent drugs policy has failed. Let's build a science-based replacement

David Nutt

Last week Professor Roger Pertwee called for cannabis to be licensed for sale, and now Tim Hollis, the Association of Chief Police Officers' lead officer on drugs, has said the current criminalisation-based approach to policing cannabis use should be reviewed. Pertwee and Hollis are bringing a welcome breath of fresh air to the debate about drugs and the harm they do.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/sep/14/cannabis-licence-legalisation-pertwee
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2010/sep/18/police-chief-decriminalise-cannabis

The government now has the chance to take a genuinely science-based approach to drugs policy. Labour took an extremely distorted and punitive view of cannabis. It rejected both scientific evidence and public opinion that its harms were relatively modest and reclassified it to Class B status under the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act so that possession for personal use can now result in up to five years in prison. Worse, Labour also instigated a policy of pursuing users with an almost religious fervour with police sniffer dogs assisting in interventions at tube stations and other places where users might be easily sequestered and searched.

Why was this done? It appears that Labour believed that cannabis was very harmful to mental health; especially that it caused schizophrenia. Yet as the advisory body the ACMD pointed out in its 2008 cannabis review, to stop one case of schizophrenia more than 5,000 young men would have to be prevented from ever using cannabis. This statistic negates any meaningful value in controlling cannabis to improve mental health.

Labour also held the view that punishment would reduce use and hence harms. There is no meaningful evidence in favour of this view. The evidence we do have - for example, from the experiences with decriminalisation in the Netherlands and some Australian states - is that decriminalisation leads to a reduction in harms.

Science cannot determine alone what the framework for drugs regulation should be. But if policy is not grounded in the science it can easily collapse into prejudice, moralism and authoritarianism. The chaos earlier this year over the "legal high" mephedrone raised very significant issues of evidence in relation to new drugs of unknown harm. Alcohol is legal yet is producing growing levels of damage which are well detailed in government reports but recommendations for harm reduction are not acted upon. A recent scientific review of drug harms, originally published in The Lancet, found that many class A drugs are in fact less harmful than alcohol. This raises further questions over the coherence of current drugs laws.
http://www.crimeandjustice.org.uk/estimatingdrugharms.html

In the face of a rising tide of dissatisfaction with the intellectual rationale for the current drugs laws, the coalition should seize the opportunity to establish a genuinely science-based approach to drugs policy.


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Latin American drug wars are our fault #drugpolicy

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Latin American drug wars are our fault
By Dan Gardner
The Ottawa Citizen
September 22, 2010

Heroin Substitute Supervision Saves Lives, UK #heroin #drugpolicy

| | 0 comments

 

Heroin Substitute Supervision Saves Lives, UK
Medical News Today
September 22, 2010

Guns and grow-ops: Conservatives should be consistent #drugpolicy

Tuesday, September 21, 2010 | | 0 comments

 


Guns and grow-ops: Conservatives should be consistent
It’s time for Tories to re-examine their views about the prohibition on mind-altering drugs
By Tom Flanagan
Globe and Mail
September 20, 2010

 

 

 

 

On the street, you see the harm drug laws cause #drugpolicy

Friday, September 17, 2010 | | 0 comments


On the street, you see the harm drug laws cause
David Bratzer
Windsor Star
September 16, 2010

New UN drugs and crime chief to focus on public health and rights-based approach #drugpolicy

| | 0 comments

New UN drugs and crime chief to focus on public health and rights-based approach
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
Press Release
September 13, 2010

Province discriminates against addicts, court finds #drugpolicy

| | 0 comments


Province discriminates against addicts, court finds
Tracey Tyler
Toronto Star
September 17, 2010

Booze Lobby Funding the No on 19 Campaign #drugpolicy

Thursday, September 16, 2010 | | 0 comments

Booze Lobby Funding the No on 19 Campaign

David Downs —  Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 2:18 PM

The California Beer & Beverage Distributors disclosed it donated $10,000 to defeat Prop 19 — which would regulate and tax marijuana like alcohol. The alcohol lobbyist's funds will help spread the lie that employers must tolerate stoned employees, and the talking point that 'California doesn't need another legal, mind-altering substance.' Alcohol causes an estimated $38 billion in costs in California each year from emergency room visits, arrests, etc, according to the Marin Institute. There are roughly 3,500 deaths annually from alcohol-related illness and more than 109,000 alcohol-related injuries in California. Conversely, pot caused 181 emergency room visits in 2008, according to a study by the non-partisan RAND Corporation, despite being used by more than four million Californians monthly.

Law Enforcement Against Prohibition spokesperson and retired Orange County, CA. judge James Gray said the booze lobby's decision was probably financial. The move echoes the tobacco and alcohol industry's help creating leading drug war group Partnership For a Drug-Free America.

“It was a really wise thing to do from a merchandising standpoint to reaffirm the distinction between a legal and an illegal drug,” he said. “They are protecting their own economic self interest.”

Prop 19 would deal a major blow to drug cartels (who get 60 percent of their funding from pot) and others profiting from the drug war. Alcohol companies purvey an addictive product that can kill alcoholics who are trying to quit. Conversely, side effects from quitting pot include irritability.

“[Prop 19] passing would be a day of mourning for the criminal class and others who profit off prohibition that hasn't worked and creates more damage than the drug itself ever could,” Gray said.

LEAP's comments came amid a news conference today reiterating their group's support for Prop 19, and lamenting the press' ability to fact check anti-19 propaganda. LEAP released a letter endorsing Prop 19 signed by dozens of California law enforcement, many retired.

Lobbyists for police chiefs and narcotics officers have come out against the measure. LEAP says actual police chiefs and beat cops want change, but are afraid to speak out.

“I won't say they're cowards,” said retired San Jose Police Chief Joseph McNamara who has a Stanford Ph.D. in public administration. “They have political and ethical considerations that prevent them from speaking out.”

McNamara said he has hosted multiple conferences with police chiefs who say they can only endorse Prop 19 in private.

“They said, 'We have a very political job. I have to respond to the chief , the mayor, the local editorial board. I can't tell the truth. I need political cover'.”

 

cartoon of the day

| | 0 comments

 

Stigma and drug users - UK report - 2010 #drugpolicy #stigma

Wednesday, September 15, 2010 | | 0 comments

http://www.ukdpc.org.uk/resources/Stigma_Expert_Commentary_final.pdf

Drug injecting room set to become permanent #supervisedinjection

| | 0 comments

 

Drug injecting room set to become permanent
ABC News
September 15, 2010

Drug injecting room set to become permanent #supervisedinjection

| | 0 comments

ABC News (Australia)
September 15, 2010

Drug injecting room set to become permanent

The New South Wales Government has announced plans to make the medically-supervised drug injecting centre at Kings Cross permanent.

The centre has been operating on a trial basis since 2001.

A review of the centre, commissioned by the government earlier this year, concluded it has successfully managed more than 3,000 overdoses and helped 12,000 drug users.

Premier Kristina Keneally says the government wants to provide more certainty for the centre because it has made a positive difference to people's lives.

"In an ideal world, the need for such a facility wouldn't exist," she said.

"The reality is different and the centre has provided help to people who are most at risk - particularly from overdose death, disease and street violence.

"It has also reduced the incidence of public injecting."

The Kings Cross Police Commander, Superintendent Tony Crandell says that while drug prohibition is not working, the centre has had a dramatic impact on drug deaths.

"Since the injecting centre my officers report upon those deaths infrequently," he said.

"Additionally I'm told by business owners and also residents of the area that the number of needles has significantly reduced in Kings Cross and that the amenity of the area has improved greatly."

Ms Keneally says there will still be extensive oversight of the centre if it becomes permanent.

"We will of course in formalising the facility ensure that it undergo regular statutory evaluations every five years," she said.

"The NSW Police Commissioner and the Director General of Health will also retain the authority to immediately revoke the centre's licence should it ever be necessary."

The centre's founding Medical Director, Dr Ingrid Van Beek has welcomed the proposal.

"It's particularly great that the work the staff have done there day in day out has finally been recognised," she said.

"These issues are too complex to be subject to party-politicking."

The Opposition Leader, Barry O'Farrell says he will allow a conscience vote on the proposal.


---------------------------------

Sydney Morning Herald
September 15, 2010

Drug experts support injecting centre

AAP

The decision to end the nine-year "trial" of Sydney's Medically
Supervised Injecting Centre (MSIC) and make it a permanent part of the
NSW health system should be applauded, say doctors and public health
advocates.

The Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) said the Kings
Cross-based facility, unique in Australia, had proven itself as a model
for reducing the community-wide impact of drugs while preventing
overdose deaths among users.

"Since the establishment of the MSIC, ambulance call-outs to drug
overdoses has fallen by 80 per cent in the Kings Cross area, a
significant achievement," said Dr Alex Wodak, chair of the Policy and
Advocacy Committee for Addiction Medicine at the RACP.
Advertisement: Story continues below

"It is high time that the charade of the temporary research status of
the MSIC was ended."

Dr Wodak said the facility, which opened amid controversy in May 2001,
had handled about 3,500 drug over-doses without recording a fatality and
now oversaw about 200 injections a day.

It also allowed some of Australia's "most severely marginalised
injecting drug users" to be referred for additional health or social
welfare services on 7,000 occasions.

NSW Premier Kristina Keneally on Wednesday announced she would introduce
legislation to end the trial status, though the MSIC would remain the
only legalised injecting centre in NSW.

Ms Keneally said the centre had helped more than 12,000 drug users and
distributed more than 300,000 clean needles and syringes.

"It has saved lives, it has reduced disease risk, it has reduced the
incidence of public injecting, and quite frankly, it has brought people
who live on the margins, who live on the edge, into contact with health
services and drug treatment services," Ms Keneally said.

The government's decision has the backing of The Public Health
Association of Australia and the Australasian Society for HIV Medicine,
which points to lower rates of needle sharing curbing the spread of
blood-borne disease.

Despite fears the centre would increase crime, NSW Police Superintendent
Tony Crandell said he believed crime in the Kings Cross area had gone
down since the injecting centre opened.

"Policing categories of robbery and theft have either plateaued or
declined, and it has certainly declined since 2006," he said.

Back-street deaths in Kings Cross from drug abuse and overdoses had also
declined in the past nine years, he said.

But Drug Free Australia secretary Gary Christian has claimed the centre
encourages users to take risks.

"We've spoken to ex-clients of the injecting room who said that the
safety allowed them to experiment with high does of heroin ..." he told
ABC Radio.

The Greens have signalled their support for the move while NSW
Opposition Leader Barry O'Farrell, who has criticised the centre for not
meeting key goals, said he would allow his MPs a conscience vote on
legislation to make the centre permanent.

Despite the move in NSW, Victorian Premier John Brumby ruled out
establishing a drug injecting centre in Melbourne saying the city had
other initiatives that had reduced over-dose deaths.

"I think we're getting on top of this problem and we've got no plans to
introduce safe injecting rooms," Mr Brumby told reporters on Wednesday.


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Tel +31-20-6626608 | Fax +31-20-6757176
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License cannabis sales, expert says #cannabis

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Subject: UK: License cannabis sales, expert says

BBC News
Science & Environment
14 September 2010

License cannabis sales, expert says

By Pallab Ghosh Science correspondent, BBC News

Policymakers should consider allowing the licensed sale of cannabis for recreational use, says one of the UK's leading researchers of the drug.

Professor Roger Pertwee is to make the call in a speech at the British Science Association festival in Birmingham.

He is expected to say radical solutions have to be considered because he believes the current policy of criminalising cannabis is ineffective.

But the government insists decriminalisation would not work.

The dismissal last year of Professor David Nutt as the previous government's leading drugs adviser showed it was in no mood to consider relaxing the status of cannabis as an illegal class B drug.

It is a view shared by the current government, but Prof Pertwee, an expert on cannabis-like chemicals, is to tell scientists that he, like Professor Nutt, believes it is a policy that is doing more harm than good

"I'm talking about harm minimisation," he told BBC News.

"At the moment there is an awful lot of harm caused by what we have at the moment, with children going to a drug dealer or they try and grow it themselves and then they get into trouble with the law."

The University of Aberdeen researcher added: "And by dealing with criminals they may well go on to other drugs as well".

Instead, Prof Pertwee argues, one option policymakers should consider is the setting up of a committee to license the sale of recreational cannabis.

"You would have to think about licensing a suitable supplier and have retail outlets and the next step would be to have marketable, branded products that someone wants to use. At the same time it's got to be as safe as possible," he explained.

Prof Pertwee said licensed products should not be sold in cigarette form
- so called "joints".
Avoiding harm

Manufacturers should instead develop products that avoid lung damage.

One delivery mechanism he said should be considered is known among drug users as a "volcano", which heats cannabis to produce a vapour without burning it.

This avoids the burnt products of cannabis that are carcinogenic.

These products should be withheld from high risk groups, he said, especially young people under the age of 21.

Successive governments have resisted efforts to decriminalise cannabis for recreational use.

Even the change in classification for the drug from "B" to the supposedly less harmful class "C" made by the then Home Secretary David Blunkett in 2002 was reversed in 2009.

So how does Professor Pertwee respond to the suggestion that what he is asking for is politically unrealistic?

He said: "What's the alternative?"

"Ideally, recreational cannabis would be banned but that's not going to happen so we're now in a situation where there is quite a lot of harm done by recreational cannabis and what we've got to do is think about a way of reducing that harm".

Commenting on Professor Pertwee's remarks, a Home Office spokesperson
said: "There is clear evidence that cannabis is a harmful drug which can cause damage to mental health in the immediate and longer-term. Even the occasional use of cannabis can be dangerous for people with diseases of the circulatory system.

"The Government does not believe that decriminalisation of cannabis is the right approach. Our priorities are clear: we want to reduce drug use, crack down on drug related crime and disorder and help addicts come off drugs for good."

----

video - Professor Pertwee discusses legalising certain forms of cannabis:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11287130#play


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