Couldn't agree more with the characterization of this article as sensationalist. Also, why post this to a forum such as Hacker News? If I wanted to read "news" of this nature, I'd go to Fox or Yahoo!
I can see a couple of reasons for this.
First, there seems to be a prevailing view here is that the war on drugs is an abject failure.
Furthermore, I believe addiction gets attention here as a fascinating scientific puzzle, whose questions and answers are deeply involved with philosophical issues such as free will and the nature of desire.
This is probably why the article made it as far up as it did on HN.