Comment by bob_theslob646 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by bob_theslob646 | Hacker News Reader

>Portugal’s remarkable recovery, and the fact that it has held steady through several changes in government – including conservative leaders who would have preferred to return to the US-style war on drugs – could not have happened without an enormous cultural shift, and a change in how the country viewed drugs, addiction – and itself. In many ways, the law was merely a reflection of transformations that were already happening in clinics, in pharmacies and around kitchen tables across the country. The official policy of decriminalisation made it far easier for a broad range of services (health, psychiatry, employment, housing etc) that had been struggling to pool their resources and expertise, to work together more effectively to serve their communities.

At least in the U.S, we thrive on _treating_ versus curing, plus , didn't you know if you fall on hard times medically especially with anything related to addiction or mental health, you have to bootstrap yourself up from your own bootstraps or go to a 5k a week rehab facility that does not accept insurance.

If drugs are legal in the U.S, who is going to pay all those private jail/prison owners excutive salaries? Where are those corporations going to get the slave labor?

Who is going to pay all those police officers all those raises for keeping drugs off the street?

How are alcohol and tobacco companies supposed to find new consumers whose lives are ruined for possession of marijuana who are unable to secure any form of higher level of employment( extremely difficult) because they were arrested for carrying marijuana.

That's why the United States has not copied it.

The fact that things work differently outside of the US yet most foreign countries still haven't adopted it suggests that none of your purported reasons are the primary cause.

They almost certainly are tiny things with very small marginal contributions when countries as varied as Russia, Australia, Sweden, Poland, Singapore, and Switzerland -- who don't have of the factors you mention -- also have failed to follow Portugal's innovation.

Many of those countries don't treat drugs anywhere near like the way the US does.

Switzerland in fact has a system very similar to what is described in this article. Methadone (and even in some cases heroin) is readily dispensed to those in need. You aren't going to end up with a 10 year sentence for possessing hard drugs, you'll be helped.

And plenty of countries without private prisons or large alcohol & tobacco companies or "slave labor" treat drugs way worse than the US.

My point isn't that "countries all treat things exactly the same". My point is that the OP's alleged reasons don't really hold up once you abandon a myopic US-centric view and actually look at other countries.

With the exception of the ones with insane politics involving execution, dictatorships or the ones that have a harsh posture because of religious motives, I can't find a single one that has a war on drugs at the same level as the United States, can you point me to some sources about democratic countries that are worse than the United States on this specific point?

Not sure how your question is relevant to the parent’s point that US centric problems are probably not the sole cause that portugal’s policies have not been adopted, given many countries outside the US also haven’t adopted the policies.

But to your question, I would note that drug laws in Japan and South Korea are among the harshest in the world.

Most of Asia has even harsher drug laws than the US does, that includes China (you know, 1.3 billion people and the world's second largest economy). Their enforcement budgets are nowhere near as large per capita and they don't have the idiotic mandatory minimum sentencing laws that the US implemented a few decades ago (which is largely the cause of the huge prison population increase).

Maybe some clarificatio on that: While it's true that heroin is distributed to hardcore addicts (at cost and paid by health insurance) it is in no way readily dispensed.

The conditions to enter those programs are rather strict. Depending on age, attempts to kick the habit and other factors.

That said. I'd say that the program is very successful for two main reasons:

It massively raises the health of the addicts and lets them actually conduct a normal life despite being addicted.

It also totally changed the image of the drug from something around hero mystique (as it had in the 80s and partially 90s) to a total loser drug. While there certainly still is a problem for a lot of addicts uptake has seriously declined.

US drives UN policy. They may be tiny US issues, but the US makes them giant world issues. The reason none of these countries has adopted a policy like Portugal's is the UN treaties. And the UN treaties exist because the US created them. Even Portugal is skating on thin ice with decriminalization but if they wanted to legalize, they would have difficulties fulfilling their obligations to the UN. In the end, until the US changes the UN treaties, few will ever go against the will of the US. That doesn't mean they don't want to or that they aren't holding back progress on this issue simply to appease the US. They most certainly are.

That wasn't the question, though. Why has no other country copied it—for example, a social-welfare state like Sweden, or a technocracy like Singapore?

Switzerland has.

In Sweden’s case it’s because we - as a nation - view non state sanctioned drug use in any form as a moral failing, rather than medical one. Lethality among heavy drug users is really high compared to Central European countries, and politicians think that’s fine as long as the stats for how many people have used drugs in any capacity look good.

In sweden, yeah, two things: there has been much, too much, batshit-insane anti drug/prohibitionist propaganda for decades. And the fact nations are bound by the UN Convention that mandate prohibition. Politicians are retards who rather see people die than legalize...

The Netherlands has had that policy since the '90s, if not earlier -- although in recent years (last 10 or so) governments have been steadily moving to a more repressive and less curative stance. Mostly because of our police's failure to deal with organized crime producing harddrugs, but they're throwing marihuana under the bus as well.

Also, think of the extra mental effort to find ways to incarcerate minorities and the lower class! We can't have our justice system burning out their brains.

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