Illegal drugs not only harm a user's mind and body, they devastate families, communities, and neighborhoods. They jeopardize public safety, prevent too many Americans from reaching their full potential, and place obstacles in the way of raising a healthy generation of young people.
To address these challenges, today we are releasing the 2012 National Drug Control Strategy -- the Obama Administration's primary policy blueprint for reducing drug use and its consequences in America. The President's inaugural National Drug Control Strategy, published in 2010, charted a new direction in our approach to drug policy. Today's strategy builds upon that approach, which is based on science, evidence, and research. Most important, it is based on the premise that drug addiction is a chronic disease of the brain that can be prevented and treated. Simply put, we are not powerless against the challenge of substance abuse -- people can recover, and millions are in recovery. These individuals are our neighbors, friends and family members. They contribute to our communities, our workforce, our economy, and help make America stronger.
Our emphasis on addressing the drug problem through a public health approach is grounded in decades of research and scientific study. There is overwhelming evidence that drug prevention and treatment programs achieve meaningful results with significant long-term cost savings. In fact, recent research has shown that each dollar invested in an evidence-based prevention program can reduce costs related to substance use disorders by an average of $18.
But reducing the burden of our nation's drug problem stretches beyond prevention and treatment. We need an all of the above approach. To address this problem in a comprehensive way, the President's new strategy also applies the principles of public health to reforming the criminal justice system, which continues to play a vital role in drug policy. It outlines ways to break the cycle of drug use, crime, incarceration, and arrest by diverting non-violent drug offenders into treatment, bolstering support for reentry programs that help offenders rejoin their communities, and advancing support for innovative enforcement programs proven to improve public health while protecting public safety.
Together, we have achieved significant reform in the way we address substance abuse. And the Affordable Care Act will -- for the first time -- require insurers to cover treatment for drug addiction the same way they would other chronic diseases. This is a revolutionary shift in how we address drug policy in America.
Over the past three decades, we have reduced illegal drug use in America. Over the long term, rates of drug use among young people today are far lower than they were 30 years ago. More recently cocaine use has dropped nearly 40 percent and meth use has dropped by half. And we can do more. As President Obama has noted, we have successfully changed attitudes regarding rates of smoking and drunk driving, and with your help we can do the same with our illegal drug problem.
Follow R. Gil Kerlikowske on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ONDCP
Why the government fails This is about all drugs.
60% of all drug users only use Marijuana, And it can't kill humans.
Gil, I think you make a good point here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP5e8HqVN0o
Honestly folks, just as with alcohol which had our Constitution amended not once, but twice, nearly an impossible feat, yet, it is high time to amend our sacred document AGAIN! Cannabis must be allowed in the commodities markets to compete with cotton, wood and other sources of useful fiber, to compete with soy, corn, rapeseed and other crops for various useful oils, and finally for herbal medicine.
Cocaine and opiates would require a user licence authorized by the person's general physician. Methamphetamine use is about the worst one. Would it go down if users could get licensed for cocaine? Coca is better than meth.
Overall, most people choose to avoid drug dependency. The unwise minority who choose poorly, they need our help because we are compassionate, loving people. The jailing business also needs to have its profit incentive removed.
Well what about the education- and the healthsystem?
Also, criminalizing "...place obstacles in the way of raising a healthy generation of young people."
Does "...an evidence-based prevention program..." include amiting to the medical value aof cannabis?
"...substance use disorders..."! If that exists than there is also an orderly substance use. So why is every user a criminal?
Where is the balanced approach, where the evidence-based prevention program?
Ich such phrasing prevails, well welcome to 1984.
The prohibition of Earth's most widely beneficial plant species is a crime against humanity. It shall NOT stand.
Is The DEA Legalizing THC? or Why we can't grow...
http://endingcannabisprohibition.yuku.com/topic/1680
They grow it, roll it and have patents. Barthwell and Bayer are set to distribute their sublingual spray, no doubt with the same pot.
So, in other words, if a pharmaceutical product contains THC extracted from the marijuana plant, that would be a legal commodity. But if you or I possessed THC extracted from the marijuana plant, that would remain an illegal commodity.
Wait, it gets even more absurd.
Since the cannabis plant itself will remain illegal under federal law, then from whom precisely could Big Pharma legally obtain their soon-to-be legal THC extracts? There’s only one answer: The federal government’s lone legally licensed marijuana cultivator, The University of Mississippi at Oxford, which already has the licensing agreements with the pharmaceutical industry in hand.