Drug decriminalization in Portugal
Time:
The paper, published by Cato in April, found that in the five years after personal possession was decriminalized, illegal drug use among teens in Portugal declined and rates of new HIV infections caused by sharing of dirty needles dropped, while the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction more than doubled.
“Judging by every metric, decriminalization in Portugal has been a resounding success,” says Glenn Greenwald, an attorney, author and fluent Portuguese speaker, who conducted the research. “It has enabled the Portuguese government to manage and control the drug problem far better than virtually every other Western country does.”
Compared to the European Union and the U.S., Portugal’s drug use numbers are impressive. Following decriminalization, Portugal had the lowest rate of lifetime marijuana use in people over 15 in the E.U.: 10%. The most comparable figure in America is in people over 12: 39.8%. Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana.
And probably fewer instances of police killing old ladies and planting drugs on them too.
May 7th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
For those few who question the efforts to legalize and decriminalize narcotics:
“We told ya so!”
May 7th, 2009 at 7:01 pm
Who would have thought otherwise?
No. There’s too much money and power in maintaining the status quo. Legalization would be a disaster for everyone in the interdiction business and for those corrupt officials on the take, to say nothing of the devastation it would wreak on organized crime.
Have a heart, Man.
Nor should we be mean, closed-minded extremists by envoking the U.S. constitution, which grants government no authority to restrict what we put into our bodies.
May 8th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
It would also be interesting if any of the drug cartels give campaign contributions to the biggest anti legalization politicians. Not saying the politicians are on the take, but when you combine money and power a politician can get bought off without even knowing it