I have posted this because I am interested in how do governments stop the deadly trade in drugs?
Nothing seems to work. Remove a few to prison, no dent in the supply lines.
Remember the Philippine war on Drugs instigated by President Rodrigo Duterte?
By 2022, the number of drug suspects killed since 2016 was officially tallied by the government as totaling 6,252.
Taken from the International Drug Policy Consortium;
The current punitive, prohibitionist drug policies implemented in ASEAN countries have not achieved their ‘drug-free’ goals nor achieved any substantial progress in reducing supply and preventing drug-related harms
President Trump has begun his own war on drugs when the military started missle strikes on Venezuela boats purported to be carrying drugs to the US
The assaults bring the total number of airstrikes on boats to 13 ‒ and total deaths to at least 57.
I think it was Robin Williams who observed. Imagine it, they tell us there is a war on drugs. With no mention of those who deal in them. Drugs who effect people’s ability to function normally & drugs are winning that war.
It cannot be stopped as there are huge profits to be made. And Governments incentivise drug dealing by making them illegal & thus increasing the profits that can be made.
The low level street dealers & those who mule drugs country to country are easy targets & their arrest does nothing to slow up the profits, as sadly the world is full of other mugs happy to take their place.
Legalise and tax drugs. Same as is done for alcohol and smoking. Turn from crime wave to tax revenue. That is the first step.
The other step is harder. It requires giving hope, positiveness & opportunity the people who can fall victim to drug use. The epidemic in the US of fentanyl abuse stems, in a significant part, from the millions who have no career opportunity, dead end Mac-job life in front of them, under-educated because of a poor public school system, and live in a shitty place. But then if you’ve all this tax revenue maybe such things can be addressed.
