Pot Luck

“When was using heroin, she lied, disappeared, and stole from her parents to support her $400-a-day habit. Her family paid her debts, never filed a police report and kept her addiction secret – until she was found dead last year of an overdose.” New York Times, October 31, 2015.

It's a sad story but, unfortunately, not unique. In 2013, the last year for which I could find statistics, nearly 9 thousand others suffered the same fate. (Additionally there were numerous deaths from other addictive drugs, including prescription medications.) There's a lot more to consider in the story, though. And many questions that are raised by it. [See also “Bowerman, Fixx, And The Mexican Cartel,” March 6, 2011]

The Times report makes us grieve with the parents, while noting the fact that they had contributed to the problem both economically, and with their silence – their cover-up to protect their own, and their daughter's reputations. We grieve even more for the girl who, for reasons we cannot imagine, became addicted, and lost her life to the addiction. They are all responsible for a preventable death and for the sorrow that surrounds it. They share the guilt, though only the parents are left to suffer, and they will do that for the rest of their lives.

But responsibility is ours as well. We are a society that deals with the drug problem more emotionally than rationally. If there are people who gain riches from the drug trade we spare no expense to track them down and prosecute them, whether high or low level, whether American or foreign. Indeed, we spend large sums to destroy poppy fields in other countries, and to aid in programs that identify and capture drug profiteers in other countries. Consequently our expenses for law enforcement and foreign aid to deal with these goals is tremendous.

And there are additional costs incurred in the justice system – the police, courts, prisons, rehabilitation facilities, etc. – and in medical facilities and funeral costs. There are certainly questions about where a young girl can get $400 each day to support her habit. It can't all have come from her mother's purse but, more likely, resulted from other violations of the law including stealing from others and placing them at risk. The costs of helping an addict's victims – money, medical costs, psychological help – and for the policing that accompanies an addict's crimes, are other drains on tax revenues. If someone is mugged or murdered to help an addict support his habit, it is destructive and expensive for society.

There are, of course, other ways to gain the funds necessary. They include the sale of stolen property, the sale of drugs to others, and the sale of self. Prostitution and illegal drugs are closely-linked “industries.”

So to deal with all these problems, we are attempting a “war” on drugs. It is our goal to eliminate the scourge. But prohibition didn't work when we tried it before. It simply created a criminal industry. Clearly it isn't working now. Nor are existing drug laws. We simultaneously delegitimize most narcotics while making the use of marijuana legal, and even praise its effects. (How fortunate for pot and its users.) What message do we send? And what are our youth to learn from a society that makes other drugs illegal because they are addicting and dangerous, while taxing us to support a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms? (Its budget, by the way, is over $1.2 billion annually.) The Bureau helps us tax these addictions while paying more tax to support the agency itself.

Why do people take drugs? Certainly peer pressure and the quest for adventure contribute. And there are those who take drugs (or drink) to escape reality. An important additional factor, however – one on which the other reasons may build – is rebellion. Most addicts begin at an age when it is fashionable to mistrust authority and to taste “forbidden fruit.” If your parents, teachers, or other authorities say “no,” it's obvious that you'll want to try. If no one cares, neither will you.

Suppose narcotics were legal. Suppose they were provided by the government (along with education and rehabilitation) at low cost and without stigma. The savings in law enforcement (and supervising government bureaus) would more than pay the costs of such a program. And the revenue from taxing producers could also be used for this purpose. The distribution by the government might also remove the attraction for some users and lessen the numbers, as well as lower the incidence of associated crime, because costs will be far lower. Taking the profit out of narcotics is likely to have a greater influence on the drug trade than policing or payments to foreign governments. (And it will eliminate, or at least sharply decrease, the injuries and deaths that occur during drug raids.)

For those who do take drugs, however, the distribution by the government would allow better supervision, education, medical and rehabilitation. (It will also take away the temptation to defy the government – at least this way.) And the materials distributed would have a known potency rather than pose the risk of drugs purchased on the streets from unknown and unregulated sources. That, by itself, should decrease the incidence of overdoses and other toxic reactions.

The families of addicts may complain that we're sanctioning a deadly substance, and that someone who hasn't lived with an addict can't imagine how horrible the disease is. And they're right. But the goal is to control the disease better and – as cynical as it may seem – to face reality. That's the approach we've taken with alcohol and tobacco. As a matter of fact, automobile deaths and those that happen in the construction industry are predictable, but we try to regulate rather than criminalize them.

Perhaps that's the way we should go with drugs.  It's worth a try.

Next episode: “Bully For You” – I hope you like bullies. There are lots of them in jail.