Only the other day, I reported that Israel were considering prescription heroin for long term addicts without a trial first. There is now irrefutable evidence that giving clean, legal heroin to some addicts benefits everyone ... except the Zero Tolerance weirdoes of course.
Denmark too has skipped the standard ‘heroin trial’ and instead are running a pilot project. The most interesting aspect is that even the conservative political parties including the Christian right, support the project. I always wonder why Australia is influenced by US drug policy as they have the one of the worst drug problems on this planet yet we ignore Europe that continually find new ways to manage the situation successfully.
Heroin project funded
A near unanimous parliament agreed on Monday to begin a two-year, DKK 70 million pilot project that will make heroin available by prescription to addicts that social workers determine to be beyond the reach of other detox methods.
The decision marks a change in political attitudes in the 15-year debate over prescription heroin.
The decisive support for the decision came from the prime minister’s Liberal Party after the health minister, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, aired what was to be a change in the government’s position during the 2007 general election campaign.
Final resistance to the idea of prescription heroin eroded after a National Board of Health report concluded recently that similar programmes in other countries had been successful.
The guidelines of the programme will be established by the end of the year, and starting in 2009 it will become the responsibility of local councils to determine which heroin addicts qualify for prescription heroin and to oversee distribution.
Funding for the pilot project was announced as part of this year’s disbursement of national Social Focus Pool funds - a Social Ministry funding programme that will contribute DKK 3.7 billion over the next three years to scores of social welfare initiatives.
The Social Focus Pool was established in 1991 and individual project funding is evaluated by parliament annually.
For me zero tollerance is the right thing to do...Emilio
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment, Emilio.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you're right ... ZT works so well.
i dont know why we dont have a heroin program in australia it would halve our crime rate and half us people on methadone could go back to work and live a half decent life unlike methadone wich does nothing but make you feel like crap and loose our teeth. but maybe our government does not want our crime rate down,jail population sizes down, not to mention deaths from overdoses,aids and hep c . yeah i really see how the no tollerance policy does real well at keeping the judges,lawyers,police,and prison guards in their jobs thats about all the no tolerance policy does
ReplyDeletei think cops ,prosecuting lawyers ,judges ( maybe even sniffer dogs)
ReplyDeleteprison wardens.. should have a camera
and hidden microphones on them at all times (actually we should microchip them like stray dogs)... i mean ..if the fascist apparatus thinks its okay for them to tap our phonecalls ( in the name of terror ..dont make me laugh)... then the people paid to "uphold laws"
aka the "Prison Industrial Complex"
should be monitored/scrutinized 24/7.. moreso than the average Jo Blow..coz obviously when money/profit motive is the agenda ( who cares about the misery it unleashes on sick people,right/)the potential for corruption/planting evidence/ignoring medical evidence and research/hiding behind some bogus religious moralising ,well the potential for corruption is Endless
If were not careful.. we'll end up with a society of 3 categories 1)Police (+cronies)
2)Informants and
3)Criminals ..spelling the death of art,music,film,objective journalism..infact anyone or anything that opposes this "democracy"also it is my view that
a good way to start is to stop giving religious institutions a tax free comfort zone so they have no funds to impose their morality
on others..especially the peaceful atheists among us...
by the way .does anyone know the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter?
Thanks Anons
ReplyDeleteIt seems a common theme that prohibition feeds the legal system and those who rely on it for a living.
The people who benefit most though are the criminals. They love prohibition and the stricter the laws, the more money they make.
It makes sence that we have a herion program hear,
ReplyDeleteis working for the swiss netherlands.
It the goverment that gave us the drugs in the first place, because it made money for them.
So why not help us now that we are dependent on them.
Our goverment is just as stipid as the US because nobody is going to get rid of drugs, so it's no point trying to fight this war on drugs.
If we help the people on drugs instead of locking them up it will save alot of money in the long run
Thanks Jax2010
ReplyDeleteAt least you have a prescription heroin program which shows some common sense.
But you are right about fighting the so called "War on Drugs". Locking up people is not going to stop drug use.