The UK and Ireland both released their own drug strategies in the last few weeks and it seems as if we’ve reached a fabled position of a ‘tale of two cities’. Regional and national drug strategies are continue to become increasingly varied, but what can we learn from two opposite examples?

The UK government came under heavy criticism for their ‘new’ 2017 Drug Strategy which many believe is a continuation of failed and dangerous policies. In England and Wales, 2015 saw the number of deaths from drug misuse increase by 10.3 per cent to 2,479. Deaths involving heroin, which is involved in around half the deaths, more than doubled from 2012 to 2015.

‘The social and economic cost of drug supply in England and Wales is estimated to be £10.7 billion a year – just over half of which (£6 billion) is attributed to drug-related acquisitive crime (e.g. burglary, robbery, shoplifting).’

The many critics point out that there is very little that can be classed as ‘new’ in the latest drug strategy. Following the release of the document a debate was held in the House of Commonswhere MPs from all sides of the house added their comments over the course of a six hour session. The mood mainly reflected the frustration that many feel towards the UK’s anchored drug policy in terms of ‘prevention’ and ‘enforcement’.

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A tale of two drug strategies 

Canadian health-care experts, including British Columbia’s provincial health officer, want the federal government to strongly consider Portugal’s approach to drug policy, including the decriminalization of personal possession.

Portugal’s model could benefit British Columbia, Perry Kendall said, noting his province has seen increased overdose deaths from illicitly produced fentanyl – a problem moving across Canada.

Portugal did not decriminalize all drugs in all circumstances, he said, noting the country’s approach removes the application of criminal law on personal possession for limited amounts while offering education and social supports.

British Columbia looks to Portugal to combat opioid crisis

Scotland’s drug strategy is to be “refreshed” as Scotland continues to face significant challenges including rising numbers of drug-related deaths. Work is also being done to look at ways to encourage older people with a drug problem into addiction services.

The moves were announced by Public Health Minister Aileen Campbell at the ‘Drug Policy Through a Health Lens’ conference in Glasgow on the 26th of July and come as a reportrevealed rising inequality in the 1980s put men from Scotland’s poorer areas who were born between 1960 and 1980 at increased risk of drug overdose deaths.

The latest figures for drug-related deaths is an all-time record of 706 for 2015. Released last August, the number was up on 613 in 2014 and 527 in 2013, with the median age of those who died rising to 41 years old in 2015, up from around 30 to 36 in the previous decade. Figures for 2016 are due to be published on the 15th of August by the National Records of Scotland.

Scotland’s drug strategy to be refreshed

With opioid overdose deaths hitting record highs throughout the US, and the White House Commission calling for declaring a state of emergency, many are looking for new solutions to addiction and overdose.

But one proposal popular in some circles — the expanded use of drug courts — is not the perfect solution some make it out to be.

Created in the 80s to expedite the overwhelmed court dockets created by the drug war, they have already enjoyed a great deal of fanfare and funding — from both sides of the political aisle. But despite the good intentions that often underpin them, they are a flawed solution.

Criminal justice reformers are hooked on drug courts, they should kick the habit

Alcoholism is a relentless condition—90 percent of patients suffer a relapse within three years. But Dr. Ben Sessa believes he’s identified a substance that could help improve these outcomes. There’s just one problem: current drug policy makes it exceedingly difficult for him to conduct research into the treatment.

That’s because the substance is MDMA, a Schedule 1 controlled substance, which is classified in both the United Kingdom and the United States as “having no medical benefits” and is thus so strictly regulated that it is almost impossible for clinical researchers to study.

Even though Dr. Sessa is a renowned clinical psychiatrist with 20 years of experience and the backing of a respected university, it’s taken him six years to get the study off the ground. The special license required to work with controlled substances cost him nearly $40,000 and took two years to acquire. The requisite lab security equipment and law enforcement monitoring cost another $50,000.

The war on drugs is holding science back

A bill making its way through the Iranian parliament could spare 5,000 convicted drug smugglers from the death penalty, the ILNA news agency reported on Monday.

“As soon as the new drug law is passed, the death sentence of more than 5,000 prisoners could be converted into prison sentences,” said Hassan Norouzi, a spokesman for parliament.

Mr. Norouzi said lawmakers are still reviewing the draft legislation, and it will not be in its final form until after they return from summer recess.

Scepticism has grown in Iran over the effectiveness of the death penalty in deterring drug smuggling, with government reports showing it has had no impact on reducing the volume and variety of drugs in Iran.

Instead, many are calling for long prison sentences combined with forced labour.

Thumbnail: Flickr CC League of Women Voters of California LWVC

Death penalty: Iranian parliament receive law meant to spare 5,000 drug smugglers

The Canadian federal government has approved the first supervised consumption site in Victoria for illicit drug users, but it will be at least a year before it opens.

“This is going to save lives and take us beyond what our overdose prevention sites are doing,” said Dr. Richard Stanwick, chief medical officer for Island Health. “Now they won’t be a stop-gap measure, they are a bridge.”

An overdose prevention site is operating there under emergency orders as a measure to cope with the overdose crisis. That site is run from a shipping container, with two booths for injection, harm-reduction supplies, a paramedic and outreach workers on-hand.

Victoria’s first supervised drug consumption site will take a year to open 

Contrary to what US Attorney General Jeff Sessions says, the recent shutdown of two major dark web sites – AlphaBay and Hansa – will not reduce the prevalence of online drug marketplaces or solve the opioid crisis. In fact, it may do the opposite.

On July 20, the US Justice Department announced their seizure of AlphaBay, the largest operating dark web marketplace. As part of a coordinated effort with Dutch police, the FBI initially pretended the website shutdown was an exit scam - whereby “the proprietors of a dark web marketplace suddenly abscond with everyone’s money” - to avoid raising suspicion among users. Authorities had correctly expected that AlphaBay customers would then move to other popular websites, including Hansa.

Thumbnail Flickr Dimitris Kalogeropoylos

Closing dark web marketplaces won’t reduce drug use or trafficking

Risma is familiar with the harms that women can face in Indonesian prisons; in 2006, she was sentenced to 18 months incarceration after being caught with a small quantity of drugs. Today, Risma is a health and human rights activist: “I was one of the beneficiaries of an NGO peer education programme in the women’s prison. I was released early for good behaviour and immediately joined the NGO as a volunteer.”

Working as a peer educator, Risma met women who had used drugs and faced debilitating stigma. Unwilling to accept this marginalisation for herself or her peers, Risma set up phone support and counselling to assist women in standing up to fight for their health and rights. “I realised there were many of us.”

The phone calls became meetings, and as the meetings slowly grew, they became known as the Women Butterfly Community. Many — particularly women who had spent time in prison—were ashamed and found it difficult to discuss their traumatic experiences in person. “We cried listening to each other’s stories.”

The Butterfly Community: A movement of women who use drugs in Indonesia

When he was elected president of the Philippines in July 2016, President Rodridgo Duterte promised to negotiate peace agreements with the major insurgent groups that have destabilised much of the country for decades.

His government announced it would commence peace talks with the representatives of the National Democratic Front, the umbrella organisation that represents both the Communist Party of the Philippines and its armed wing, the New People’s Army. Duterte also committed himself to a peace agreement with the Philippines’ largest insurgent group, the Moro Islamic Liberation Front.

At the time, these seemed like breakthroughs in the making. But the early optimism has dissolved, and the peace talks have stalled. While the government does seem genuinely willing to negotiate, the president seems to be been prioritising another one of his election campaign promises: eradicating crime and drugs.

Philippines’ ongoing war on drugs shatters hopes of peace for a generation

The Philippines’ human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic is a “national emergency,” the head of the AIDS Research Group of the health department’s Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM) said on Monday.

Dr. Rossana Ditangco warned that the government’s current approach to the epidemic means that “we can’t control the rapid rise of HIV infection.”

Ditangco is no fear-monger. The latest statistics from the UNAIDS’ 2017 report indicates the rate of HIV infection in the Philippines has become the highest in the Asia Pacific region. That data demonstrates that in 2016, 83 percent of new infections in the Philippines occurred among men who have sex with men and transgender women who have sex with men. The sharp rise in new HIV infections in the Philippines since 2010 stands in sharp contrast to decreasing or stagnant rates of new infections in other parts of the Asia-Pacific region. Philippine Department of Health data indicates that the country’s HIV infection rate grewby 140 percent from 2010 to 2016, with two out of three new HIV infections among 15 to 24-year-old men who have sex with men.

Philippines HIV epidemic declared a 'national emergency'

Women continue to be disproportionately affected by drug use, and face obstacles in accessing treatment, compared to men, according to the President of the United Nations International Narcotics Control Board (INCB).

Viroj Sumyai, who presented the Board's Annual Report on 6 July to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), urged Member States to integrate gender perspectives in the elaboration of their drug policies to address this discrepancy.

According to the report, drug-related harms to women and the resulting consequences for communities are often “sorely under-studied,” and gender-disaggregated data on drug use are rarely collected.

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