Addicts need helping hand, not handcuffs

It’s time to decriminalize drugs, write David Khan and David Swann.

It is time we treat addicts as people with a horrible disease. They are deeply sick. They are not criminals. We are calling for the decriminalization of drugs as an essential strategy for reducing stigma and improving their chances of healing.

In a decriminalized environment individuals with more than a few doses of the drug can still be criminally charged for trafficking. But those using personally are directed to mental health and social supports. These include housing, nutrition and medical treatments demonstrated to save many lives and dollars over time.

Decriminalization is not legalization. Let’s be very clear. Decriminalization means those with devastating mental illness and addiction are led to help and recovery — not thrown into jail.

Decriminalization removes the terrible stigma that keeps drug abuse ‘underground’ — hidden and shameful. It isolates people suffering from the disorder. It keeps them apart from the essential assistance needed for recovery. There are mental, social, spiritual, and educational avenues that must be used to help them become healthy again.

The financial costs of continuing to criminalize people are substantial. Through the National Anti-Drug Strategy (NADS launched in 200708), the federal government has spent close to $1 billion to date on recurrent hospital visits, policing, court proceedings, incarceration, and woefully inadequate services in jails. On top of that, more than $550 million is also budgeted for NADS between 2017-18 to 2021-22. This funding could instead be spent on treatment, healing and skills training. These all help to address the root causes of the problem.

Over the past 20 years, other countries have shown the punishment of people in distress simply adds to the distress and repeats the vicious cycle of drug use to relieve the psychological and physical pain. Portugal has provided leadership on this issue. There have been dramatic reductions in people with addictions, overdose deaths and infectious disease due to addictions in that European country. We were both skeptical of their 17-year decriminalization experiment. But the results are clear. They challenged health and justice policy-makers to rethink the terrible toll in lives and dollars. They achieved some peace in the war on drugs.

But Portugal also discovered that decriminalization is not a perfect solution for a complex problem. It must be part of an integrated strategy that combines large new investments in timely mental health treatment options, housing and social supports and extended education programs. This must include providing trauma-informed care for mental health professionals at all levels. It’s taken a decade to come to this conclusion.

Decriminalization is not the same as legalization. It does not contribute to addiction. It can contribute to healing a growing population of people and reduce addiction levels. There is strong and growing evidence for our position. It is time for the federal Liberal government to be bold and demonstrate social leadership by moving to decriminalize all drugs.

Let’s prevent thousands of additional deaths. Let’s reach out to rescue lost youth, women and men.