The war on drugs has failed: Time to stop fighting and start thinking

By Magdy Martínez-Solimán - The Guardian

When the world’s nations committed to the sustainable development goals (SDGs) last year, they probably weren’t thinking about drugs. But they should have been. Without effective drug control strategies, marginalisation, poverty and inequality will persist in societies. Evidence shows that prohibitionist approaches have not worked – from 1998 to 2008 the number of people using illicit drugs did not change significantly and neither did the area used for opium poppy cultivation. Conventional policies have failed in reducing addiction and production.

Drug policy is connected to core areas of sustainable development: health and wellbeing, gender equality, justice and strong institutions. The population ofwomen imprisoned for drug-related offences is on the rise (pdf). Prison sentences for women may result in the incarceration of their infants and young children, who stay with them for all or part of their sentence.

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