May 2016 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| 9
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WITH SOME EXCITEMENT
and a good helping
of scepticism I set off to Vienna for my first
Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND), which
occurs annually and is the central drug policy-
making body within the United Nations
system. It was the event that was going to
draft proposals for the UNGASS, which we had
been working towards for the past three years.
I decided to try and soak up the experience,
but when adding the term ‘abuse’ to a UN
document was seen as a success, I knew it was
going to be a long week.
The main purpose of the meeting was to
create an outcome document that would be
‘short, substantive, concise and action-
oriented’. It was an opportunity for a detailed
examination of the linkages between
prohibition, violence and organised crime, the
corrosive impact of corruption on many
countries, to explore new distribution systems
and revisit the ‘world drug problem’.
Proposals had also been tabled to ensure
that drug control measures were in harmony
with treaties safeguarding human rights and
to push back against countries applying the
death penalty for drug offences.
Sadly none of this happened. After the
week the consensus statement simply
reaffirmed the three existing drug control
conventions with no admission of flaw, fault
or contradiction.
I didn’t get it – how could so many
countries not fight for the end of the death
penalty, or insist all countries provide humane
evidence-based treatment for drug problems?
Why did so many allow international
diplomacy to miss the opportunity for real
change around drug control?
But there were some rays of hope. For the
first time ‘access to controlled medications for
medical use’ was added. Many palliative care
and pain organisations had been striving for
this for many years and we had focused on
this in our campaign leading up to the
UNGASS (
DDN
, February, page 17).
The ‘outcome document’ signed off in
Vienna was immediately adopted in New York,
meaning there was no room for change –
people found this deeply frustrating. The
document didn’t acknowledge the
comprehensive failure of the current drug
control regime to reduce drug supply and
demand, or the damaging effects of outdated
policies on violence and corruption as well as
on population health, human rights and
wellbeing.
UNGASS did not address the critical flaws
of international drug policy, call for an end to
the criminalisation and incarceration of drug
users or even urge states to abolish capital
punishment for drug-related offences! Had we
hoped for too much? Perhaps we need to
accept and celebrate the great work many
governments and civil society groups have
achieved and the many positive drug policy
reforms already underway around the world.
This is going to be the way forward –
individual countries making changes.
The next international opportunity to
address this will be in 2019 when the UN plan
of action that calls for a ‘drug-free world’ will
be reviewed. We must continue to fight for
health and human rights to be at the centre of
all future drug policy.
Dr Chris Ford is clinical director of IDHDP.
Cautious Progress
‘When
adding
the term
“abuse”
to a UN
document
was seen as
a success,
I knew it
was going
to be a
long week.’
from our foreign correspondent
first person
Dr Chris Ford
on the importance of
keeping up the momentum
THE PSYCHOACTIVE SUBSTANCES ACT
should have become law today, but
its implementation has been delayed
while ministers work out what they
have banned… The legislation is an
attempt to clamp down on designer
substances that, for instance, mimic
the effects of cannabis; yet arrests
for possession of the real drug have
collapsed in the past five years
because the police say they have
better things to do. The
number of people
cautioned or charged for
possessing cannabis has
also fallen dramatically
even though survey data
suggests cannabis use
remained roughly level over
the same period. This
policy is confusing and
incoherent. The
government needs to be sure
its new act works properly
before putting it into practice.
Telegraph
editorial, 5 April
JUST SAY NO
. That’s supposed to be
our reaction to recreational drugs.
The trouble is, lots of people say yes
please. As a result, the world’s
governments have been waging a war
on drugs for more than a century.
Since 1961, the battle has been
orchestrated via international treaties
targeting all parts of the supply
chain, from the producers to the
smugglers, the sellers to the buyers.
Yet this supposedly united front has
developed some conspicuous cracks.
New Scientist
editorial, 6 April
HOWARD MARKS
won affection
because he lived a big, brash, blame-
filled life, and, more importantly, was
never, ever boring. His tales were
strewn with innocent victims, but
who cared, because he was such a
stonkingly good raconteur.
Grace Dent,
Independent
, 11 April
[HOWARD MARKS]
never bumped
anyone off himself. But sending a few
million to a Colombian drug cartel is
no better than doing business with
Islamic State. It may even be worse:
the sadistic inventiveness of Latin
America’s cartel hitmen is more
sophisticated than anything that
goes on in the ‘caliphate’.
Tom Wainwright,
Guardian
, 12 April
[HOWARD MARKS]
was a fierce and
instinctive defender of free speech, a
rare and precious quality…
What a pleasing contrast he was to
the pitiful Nick Clegg, who
ceaselessly calls for drug law
liberalisation with the ingratiating
smarminess of a newly hatched
curate.
He was at it again on the BBC’s
Newsnight
last week. The
programme, which recently gave the
ridiculous Russell Brand a free
platform for his wet opinions on
drugs, filmed Mr Clegg wandering
around Colombia, mouthing pro-
legalisation pieties.
The former deputy prime
minister clearly knows almost
nothing about the subject. He’s
never met a cliché or a fat, juicy slab
of conventional wisdom that he
doesn’t like.
Peter Hitchens,
Mail on Sunday
,
18 April
The news, and the skews, in the national media
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