What Countries Legalise Drugs

What Countries Legalise Drugs

During my visits over the course of a month, I met with some of the peer support staff, including João, a compact, blue-eyed man who rigorously reviewed the details and nuances of what I was learning. João wanted to make sure I understood that their role in the reception center is not to force someone to stop using it, but to help minimize the risks to which users were exposed. Goulão was a 20-year-old medical student when he was offered his first heroin attack. He refused because he didn`t know what it was. When he finished his studies, got his license to practice medicine and started practicing medicine at a health center in the southern city of Faro, it was everywhere. Like Pereira, he specialized in drug treatment. Full legalization is often proposed by groups such as libertarians who oppose drug laws on moral grounds, while regulated legalization is proposed by groups such as Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, which oppose drug laws because they fail to achieve their stated goals and greatly exacerbate the problems associated with illicit drug use. But they recognize that there are harms associated with currently banned drugs that need to be minimized. Not all proponents of drug relegalization necessarily share a common ethical framework, and people may take this view for a variety of reasons. In particular, advocating the legalization of drugs does not mean consenting to drug use. [17] [18] [19] Because each country has its own regulations and most distinguish between different classes of drugs, it can be difficult to regulate which ones should be more accessible, as a particular drug that is criminalized in one region might be perfectly acceptable elsewhere. Pinto M, Oliveira MJ, Teles S, Carvalho H, Queiroz J, Rodrigues C, et al. Austerity measures and the Portuguese drug model: mixed-methods frontier research.

V. N. Gaia: APDES; 2015. www.researchgate.net/publication/332152688_Austerity_and_the_Portuguese_Drug_Policy_Model_An_exploratory_mixed_method_research. Retrieved 3 February 2020. The legalization of drugs would affect the supply and demand that exists today with these illicit substances. The price of production would increase due to the costs associated with the transportation and distribution of these substances. [34] Drug prohibition has been found to have resulted in a reduction in the surplus of users. The decrease in consumption is due to the increase in the price of these drugs. Individuals reacted to price increases from high levels, rather than reacting to prices that started low.

[35] This is a clear example of how supply and demand are influenced. Argentina is also discussing the decriminalization of other drugs for personal use, but has not yet done so. People who have committed drug-related offences are currently the second largest group in prisons and their number has increased in recent years. After the socio-cultural change and diversification of drug use patterns in Portugal, which were later observed in Portugal but are somehow identical to the main European trends, drug use defies its label of something that takes place on the margins of society. In addition to focusing on normalizing the use of certain illicit drugs and recreational use [59], research has focused on patterns of use defined as functional [60], independent [61], religious [62], healthy [63], socially integrated [64] and non-problematic [57, 65]. These data are gaining momentum to argue for the need to consolidate the ongoing paradigm shift, including by strengthening health concepts broad enough to take into account well-being and not just pathology, which is obviously a bad concept when it comes to strengthening and respecting the dignity of people who use drugs. As noted earlier, such pathologization serves to undermine the capacity and self-determination of drug users [37]. Updated data on persons registered under the Drug Act (31.

December 2019) indicate 1862 inmates (the second lowest number in this decade) who were convicted primarily of trafficking (76%), followed by minor transactions (24%). The “other” category represents less than 1% [27]. Notably, there is no information on the crime of drug use. The increase in punitive measures raises the question of what has happened in Portugal over the past decade and the role actually played by the 2008 Supreme Court decision. Hughes C, Stevens A. What can we learn from the Portuguese decriminalisation of illicit drugs? F. J Criminol. 2010;50(6):999-1022. doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azq038. On November 9, 2018, Thailand`s National Assembly formally proposed to allow the authorized medical use of marijuana, legalizing what was previously considered a dangerous drug. Drug legalization: The subject is full of controversies and endless arguments. On the one hand, those who oppose the legalization of dangerous drugs could potentially lead to more people accessing them and developing addictions and overdoses, which could obviously become a serious problem for governments and communities.

Share this post