Category Archives: War On Drugs

Mike Marshall is the co-founder and director of Oregon Recovers. He says he's concerned the state is failing to expand addiction treatment capacity in a strategic way. "So we put the cart before the horse," he says. Eric Westervelt/NPR hide caption

Mike Marshall is the co-founder and director of Oregon Recovers. He says he's concerned the state is failing to expand addiction treatment capacity in a strategic way. "So we put the cart before the horse," he says.

Last fall Oregon voters decriminalized possession of small amounts of almost all hard drugs, taking a groundbreaking step away from the arrest, charge and jail model for possession that's been a centerpiece of American drug policy since President Richard Nixon declared his War on Drugs 50 years ago this week.

Oregonians overwhelmingly passed Measure 110 that makes possession of small amounts of cocaine, heroin, LSD and methamphetamine, among other drugs, punishable by a civil citation akin to a parking ticket and a $100 fine. That fee can get waived if you get a health screening from a recovery hotline.

The measure, a major victory for advocates pushing for systemic change in U.S. drug policy, expands funding and access to addiction treatment services using tax revenue from the state's pot industry as well as from expected savings from a reduction in arrests and incarceration.

For years Oregon has ranked near the top of states with the highest rates of drug and alcohol addiction and near the very bottom nationally in access to recovery services. And while critics everywhere have long called the drug war a racist, inhumane fiasco that fails to deliver justice or health, Oregon is the first to take a leap toward radically changing those systems.

"What we've been doing for the last number of decades has completely failed," says Mike Schmidt, district attorney for Oregon's most populated county, Multnomah, which includes Portland. Schmidt, who publicly supported Measure 110, says he firmly believes the health model not criminalization is the best way to battle the disease substance use disorder.

"Criminalization keeps people in the shadows. It keeps people from seeking out help, from telling their doctors, from telling their family members that they have a problem," Schmidt says.

Moving to emphasize health care over incarceration, supporters hope, will also start to remove the stigmatizing obstacles that often follow, including difficulty landing jobs, housing and student loans, and getting a professional license in a variety of fields.

Tera Hurst, executive director of the Oregon Health Justice Recovery Alliance, says the state's decriminalization marks bold systemic change. "We can't nibble around the edges on this," she says. Oregon Health Justice Recovery Alliance hide caption

"The War on Drugs has been primarily really waged on communities of color. People's lives have been destroyed," says Tera Hurst, executive director of the Oregon Health Justice Recovery Alliance, which campaigned last year to pass decriminalization and is now pushing to see it's fully funded and implemented. "We can't nibble around the edges on this. It's really important to me that we smash the stigma on addiction and drug use. And this helps get us closer to that."

But five months since decriminalization went into effect, the voter-mandated experiment is running into the hard realities of implementation. Realizing the measure's promise has sharply divided the recovery community, alienated some in law enforcement and left big questions about whether the Legislature will fully fund the measure's promised expansion of care.

Even many recovery leaders here who support ending the criminalization of addiction are deeply concerned the state basically jumped off the decriminalization cliff toward a fractured, dysfunctional and underfunded treatment system that's not at all ready to handle an influx of more people seeking treatment.

Advocates for decriminalization "don't understand the health care side, and they don't understand recovery," says Mike Marshall, co-founder and director of the group Oregon Recovers.

"Our big problem is our health care system doesn't want it, is not prepared for it, doesn't have the resources for it and honestly doesn't have the leadership to begin to incorporate that [expanded treatment]," says Marshall, who is in long-term recovery himself.

"My drug of choice from beginning to end was alcohol," he says, "but the last 10 years was dominated by crystal meth."

Oregon supporters of decriminalization point to Portugal as a reform model. In 2001, Portugal dramatically changed its approach and decriminalized all drugs. The nation began treating addiction as a public health crisis. There, anyone caught with less than a 10-day supply of any drug gets mandatory medical treatment.

But Marshall and others point out that Portugal took more than two years to transition carefully to a new system and replace judges, jails and lawyers with doctors, social workers and addiction specialists.

"So we put the cart before the horse," he says.

In fact, Marshall and others worry the treatment and harm reduction horse isn't even on its feet in Oregon, which is leaving too many stuck in a dangerous pre-treatment limbo and at potential risk of overdosing.

"There were no resources and no mechanisms in [Measure] 110 to actually prepare the health care system to receive those folks," Marshall says.

"Most places that have successfully done decriminalization have already worked on a robust and comprehensive treatment system," says Dr. Reginald Richardson, director of the state Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission. "Unfortunately, here in Oregon, we don't have that. What we have is decriminalization, which is a step in the right direction."

There's also shockingly little state data to determine what programs work best or to track treatment outcomes and share best practices. There's also no agreed upon set of metrics or benchmarks to judge treatment efficacy, both in Oregon and nationally.

And the pandemic struck and decimated a treatment system that was already struggling, experts here say. Because of social distancing and other pandemic protocols, Oregon, like many states, had to reduce the number of treatment beds and services. That's left the system reeling just as decriminalization programs try to take flight.

"We've got significant trouble in terms of workforce, having the right people, qualified people and enough people to provide services to folks who struggle with addiction," Richardson tells NPR. "And we've got underfunding by about a third to treatment providers."

Indeed, even some closely involved with implementing the new measure are privately voicing growing concerns. "I really hope we don't spend the next 10 to 12 months with open air drug markets and nowhere to send" those seeking help, said one official who asked not to be named because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly.

Complicating implementation is that Oregon can't get matching federal Medicaid money, a key funding source for states, to expand treatment under Measure 110 because it's using tax revenue from the legal sale of marijuana, which the federal government still classifies as a Schedule 1 illegal drug.

Today, anyone across Oregon caught by police with small amounts of hard drugs is issued a civil citation like a traffic ticket not a criminal charge. So if you're found holding, among other drugs, up to 2 grams of methamphetamine or cocaine, 40 hits of LSD or oxycodone, up to a gram of heroin, you get a citation and a $100 fine. That fine goes away if you agree to get a health screening through an addiction recovery hotline, an assessment that might lead to counseling or treatment.

Measure 110 did allocate millions in new treatment funding money funneled from the state's marijuana tax along with expected savings from reductions in arrests and incarceration.

But Marshall and others are alarmed that it did not require those funds be spent in a strategic way to expand capacity for a system that has too few detox beds, not enough residential or outpatient treatment and recovery chairs, not enough sober housing and too few harm reduction programs.

These are all services that will be desperately needed, Marshall says, as more people get pushed out of the criminal justice system and into the health system.

Mike Schmidt, district attorney for Multnomah County, Ore., strongly supports the decriminalization shift underway. "What we've been doing for the last number of decades has completely failed," he says. Eric Westervelt/NPR hide caption

"Many times the only way to get access to recovery services is by being arrested or interacting with the criminal justice system. Measure 110 took away that pathway," he says.

"I know that it takes an intervention for many of us to be saved" from addiction, says Jim O'Rourke, a Portland lawyer who opposed Measure 110 and who is also in long-term recovery.

Arrest, he says, can give people the push they need to finally get help.

"The threat of having to go through a judicial process gave them the external motivation they needed to do something that their internal motivation wasn't strong enough to get done," O'Rourke says. Addiction is a disease "that takes over the brain, it takes over your executive function." A citation and a potential fine, he believes, "just isn't strong enough."

Opponents say that's especially true since there's basically no consequence if anyone now cited for possession simply ignores the ticket.

"If word on the street is it's only 100 bucks and you don't go to jail, boom, chances are they're going to toss it," says Pam Pearce, founder of Oregon's first high school dedicated to youth recovery. She is also in long-term recovery.

"If it's like a parking ticket, what is the person's motivation [to get help]?" asks Pearce, who's now executive director of Community Living Above, an Oregon substance abuse prevention organization. "We're talking heroin, meth, cocaine and acid it's not child's play."

But decriminalization advocates counter that jail pathway to potential treatment was so flawed, biased and ineffectual for so long it had to be taken away.

The percentage of arrestees who successfully followed through on addiction treatment was low. And on average a huge percentage of those convicted of drug possession in the state were rearrested within three years.

"When you look at recidivism rates," says Schmidt, the Multnomah district attorney, "70% and 80% were getting rearrested. That's a complete and utter failure."

A key selling point to Oregon voters was that decriminalization would significantly reduce or even eliminate racial and ethnic disparities in convictions and arrests. Blacks make up just over 2% of Oregon's population. But as in the rest of the country, they've experienced far higher arrest rates for drug possession here than whites. Oregon Blacks are 2.5 times as likely to be convicted of a possession felony as whites, who make up 76% of the population.

The Oregon Criminal Justice Commission estimates that Measure 110 will reduce those disparities and result, overall, in about 4,000 fewer Oregonians a year getting convicted of felony or misdemeanor possession of illegal drugs.

Julia Mines is executive director of the Miracles Club, the state's only place targeting the African American recovering community. At most treatment centers, she says, "When we come in, there's nobody that looks like us." Julia Mines hide caption

Julia Mines is executive director of the Miracles Club along Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in northeast Portland. It's the state's only place targeting the African American recovering community.

"At the beginning of this, I wasn't for it," Mines says. "It took me to go to prison to get my, you know, get on the right track."

Mines had gone far off-track because of a cocaine addiction. She lost jobs, friends and two children one to foster care and one to adoption.

"Because I chose crack over my children," she says.

Mines eventually went to prison for selling the drug, though she now chuckles at the "major dealer" moniker she was given in court following a police sting that caught her selling less than 1,000 feet from a school.

"Like they really put a big dope dealer off the street!" she says with a laugh. "I wasn't no dope dealer; I was a user, come on now!"

Mines says she changed her mind on Measure 110 when she realized it might mean a chance to end the criminalization of addiction that continues to ravage people in her community. She's now on one of the measure's implementation committees.

"I made my voice loud and clear: I'm here representing the African American community, and that if we're going to implement this, that we need to have resources for the people that are just getting those citations," she says.

Mines says she hopes new resources eventually help her turn Miracles, now mostly a place to hold recovery meetings, into Portland's first full-scale treatment facility tailored to people of color.

"When we go to treatment centers, when we come in, there's nobody that looks like us," Mines says, "and nobody's willing to take a look at our culture and try to understand the historical and generational trauma."

This month her program took a step in that direction. The Miracles Club was among 48 groups statewide that shared $10 million under the first wave of Measure 110 funding. Mines says she'll now be able to hire three new peer mentors as well as additional support staff.

"But this funding is only for six months. So what's coming down the line after this?" she asks. "You know, that's the question mark right now, actually, a big question mark."

Mines says she has yet to see anyone come in to one of Miracles' thrice daily recovery meetings because of a possession citation and health screening under the new decriminalization policy.

That sluggish start is mirrored statewide. So far Measure 110's new 24/7 addiction recovery help line where people who get a possession citation can call is mostly quiet. Nearly five months in, just 29 people who've been issued a possession citation by police have called the line for an addiction health screening, according to Dwight Holton, CEO of Lines for Life, the Oregon nonprofit that runs what's formally called the Telephone Behavioral Health Resource Network.

"I'm excited about helping Oregon law enforcement see this tool as a bridge to recovery," Holton says. "That's what it needs to be."

A proposal in the Legislature would address some of Measure 110's implementation challenges and sharpen rules and oversight. But that, too, has stoked controversy. Among other things, the bill proposes doing away with that $100 fine for possession, arguing that the fee would adversely affect low-income folks with a substance use disorder. The bill would also change the addiction health assessment for those caught with hard drugs into what critics call a less rigorous screening.

Meanwhile, many Oregon police leaders, while mostly staying out of the public fray as implementation debates roil, are privately worried.

"They're frustrated, they're annoyed, they're concerned," says Jim Ferraris, immediate past president of the Oregon Association Chiefs of Police. He spent more than four decades in Oregon policing.

The state's Criminal Justice Commission records show about 9,000 people were arrested each year in Oregon for simple drug possession before Measure 110. Despite the drop in arrests, Ferraris says, "People are still committing crimes to get money, to buy dope, to support their habit. So how is this [decriminalization] going to impact that cycle?"

Jim Ferraris is the immediate past president of the Oregon Association Chiefs of Police. "We're going to see more and more people needing help because drugs are going to be more readily available and there's no one keeping it in check," he says. Jim Ferraris hide caption

Efforts to stop large-scale trafficking in Oregon continue as usual. Local and multiagency and regional drug interdiction task forces say their work goes on apace.

"Measure 110 has not affected our work at all," says a regional spokeswoman for the Drug Enforcement Administration.

The Oregon Legislature in 2017 had already made possession of small amounts of hard drugs here a misdemeanor, not a felony. But some say full decriminalization has had a demoralizing effect on that work.

"We're already hearing of people coming into Oregon to use because they know they can do drugs and sleep outside and police can't do anything about it," says a frustrated central Oregon officer who asked not be named because of his work in drug interdiction.

Preliminary state numbers show that opioid overdoses were up sharply in 2020, though officials say that likely has more to do with the deadly pandemic's social, emotional and financial impact than decriminalization.

Still, the experiment here has launched with the pandemic's shadow still very much hanging over the recovery community. Several organizations contacted by NPR said the number of people relapsing, anecdotally anyway, has skyrocketed.

In fact, some groups say they're having trouble finding enough peer counselors because so many are back using.

"The relapse numbers have gone up so much," says Eli Staas with the 4th Dimension Recovery Center in Portland. "For a lot of people the [pandemic's] isolation especially is what took them back out" of sobriety.

Now with decriminalization, one law enforcement official who asked not to be named because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly predicts within a year Oregon "will be inundated with (more) folks who have substance use disorder."

A key person to help lead Oregon through this rocky transition is 36-year-old old Tony Vezina, who founded 4th Dimension in Portland, the state's first youth-oriented recovery program. He's also the new chair of Oregon's Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission, which is tasked with improving treatment services.

"Been in and out of jail since I was, ya know, about 14 years old," Vezina says. "My roots are in trailer parks of Pocatello, Idaho. A history of crime and trauma and poverty on both sides of my family. Ya know, and I was a product of all that."

Now more than nine years sober from what he calls a crippling meth and heroin addiction, Vezina says as commission chair he's committed to having tough conversations across a treatment community that remains divided over the best way to implement Oregon's bold, voter-mandated experiment.

Tony Vezina, executive director of 4th Dimension Recovery Center and chair of the Oregon Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission, is nine years sober. "Now we need to rapidly design a new system strategically," he says. "But Oregon doesn't operate strategically around this issue." Eric Westervelt/NPR hide caption

"We haven't built anything new, so now we need to rapidly design a new system strategically. But Oregon doesn't operate strategically around this issue. So we don't have a new intervention system. We don't have a recovery-oriented system of care," Vezina says. "We've just decriminalized."

"We all need to work together to make sure that people get the intervention and the support they need to change their lives because it's really hard for people," he says, adding, "It's really hard for me."

Some police, however, are predicting darker days ahead.

"We're going to see more and more people needing help because drugs are going to be more readily available and there's no one keeping it in check," says Ferraris, recently retired as police chief in Woodburn, Ore. "Overdoses will go up, crime will go up and cartel drug dealing will continue to flourish up and down the I-5 corridor."

But supporters of decriminalization say that is largely last-gasp fearmongering by unreconstructed drug warriors who won't accept that the interdict, arrest and jail model has failed.

"We all need to be along for a long-term systems change," says Hurst of the Oregon Health Justice Recovery Alliance. She and other advocates say it's far too early to make any judgments about Oregon's experiment. The metrics to watch over the coming years, she says, is how well Measure 110 expands access to detox and treatment services statewide.

"There are so many centers across our state that don't just need investments, they've been starved," she says.

Still, those involved helping that system change take flight are keenly aware the nation will be carefully watching what Hurst hopes will become a model for other states looking to stop arresting and charging people with a substance use disorder.

"This could make or break kind of the movement on some level if Oregon wasn't able to pull it together. But I don't think that will happen," Hurst says. "I hope other states take notice, and they watch. And we're going to learn a lot."

"Maybe there would have been a better way to glide path this [Measure 110] on," prosecutor Schmidt says of implementation. But the Multnomah County district attorney says a jolt was needed. Merely tinkering with drug and addiction policy wasn't working.

"Sometimes you just need to stop the way you're doing it," Schmidt says, "to put some urgency behind fixing the systems that need to come into place."

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Oregon's Pioneering Drug Decriminalization Experiment Is Now Facing The Hard Test - NPR

WASHINGTON Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09), a senior member of the Judiciary Committee, today questioned witnesses at a Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security hearing on Undoing the Damage of the War on Drugs: A Renewed Call for Sentencing Reform.

In his remarks, Congressman Cohen noted what he called the true reason for the War on Drugs revealed by former Nixon Administration senior domestic adviser John Ehrlichman in a 1994 article in Harpers Magazine.

Mr. Ehrlichman said, You want to know what this is really about? The Nixon campaign in 1968 and the Nixon White House after that had two enemies: the anti-war Left and Black people. You understand what Im saying? We knew we couldnt make it illegal to be either against the war or Black but, by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and Blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings and vilify them night after night on the evening news.

Congressman Cohen said that that the War on Drugs since the 1930s has been a campaign against Black and Brown Americans: racist, racist, racist, and always has been and still is.

Congressman Cohen, the Chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, noted that he introduced a Constitutional amendment in January to reform the pardon power so that, as he put it, it is about mercy and justice and not taking care of cronies and covering up crimes. He said it should be used to commute non-violent drug offense sentences.

See the entire exchange here.

Witnesses at todays hearing were:

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Congressman Cohen Questions Expert Witnesses at a Hearing on Sentencing Reform - Congressman Steve Cohen

Theres arguably no piece of legislation in the modern era which has been more ineffective, needlessly cruel or morally insane than the Misuse of Drugs Act. Last week saw its 50th anniversary. And over the course of that half century it has maimed and mutilated countless lives, thrown hundreds of thousands of people pointlessly in prison, and accomplished the square root of absolutely nothing at all.

The facts speak for themselves. Dame Carol Blacks review of drugs for the Home Office last year found that 3 million people took drugs in England and Wales in 2019. Drug use has shot up since 1971, when the Act was passed. Less than 10,000 people took heroin back then, whereas over 250,000 do now. Cannabis use has gone from under half a million to over 2.5 million today. Around one per cent of adults had tried drugs in the 60s, compared to around a third now. Its fair to say that the legislation has not worked for that which it was intended to achieve.

The illicit drugs market is worth an estimated 9.4 billion a year, most of which is directed towards sustaining criminal gangs. In recent years, the county lines system has begun to supply drugs from an urban hub towards rural or coastal towns, displacing local dealers. One of its marked features is the exploitation of children, typically aged around 15-17, who are deployed as runners transporting drugs and money.

On any given day, a third of the prison population is there for drug related crime around 40% for convictions on the basis of specific drug offences and 60% for crimes related to drug addiction, like theft. In prison, they continue to use drugs. Random drug test data suggests 12,500 inmates about 15% of the total population are using drugs on any given day. Most users entered prison with a drug problem, but eight per cent of female inmates and 13% of males developed their problem with drugs while they were incarcerated.

These figures do not include the people who are given a caution for drug possession, many of them teenagers. We rarely talk about this, because it doesnt involve a prison sentence, and therefore seems fairly small-fry. But cautions involve an admission of guilt and therefore constitute a criminal record. They freeze countless thousands of young people out of many of the professions and kneecap their career before it has even begun.

Under any possible analysis, the war on drugs has been an unmitigated failure. More people take drugs, more people die of them, more people end up in prison, and more money is funnelled into criminal gangs. For half a century we have tried to accomplish something which cannot be done. We have legislated for what is inconceivable. And, in reality, we have fuelled the worst possible side-effects of drug use: broken lives, dead bodies and rich criminals.

If the world made any sense, the political class would accept that the legislation has failed. It would acknowledge that people are clearly going to take drugs regardless of whether they are banned or not. It would prioritise their protection rather than their criminalisation. It would read the data, recognise the endless wave of needless suffering it reflects, and do something to change it.

But the world does not make any sense and therefore the political class has done something else, which is actually quite startlingly insane. It has drawn the curtains, turned off the lights, and pretended that reality does not exist. It has closed itself off from expert opinion and the basic facts of narcotics use so that it can justify continuing with a demonstrably failed policy.

In many ways, drug policy was an early forerunner of post-truth politics. Anyone who tried to point out what was really happening was ignored, or, if they refused to keep ignoring reality, punished. In 2009, David Nutt, chairman of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, a statutory body which reports to the government on drug harms, contributed to a paper assessing the damage of various narcotics. His analysis of nine parameters of harm suggested alcohol was the fifth most harmful drug after heroin, cocaine barbiturates and methadone, but ahead of LSD, ecstasy or cannabis. The response of the then-home secretary, Alan Johnson, was to dismiss him.

This is the standard operating model which successive governments have used. For decades now, parliamentary select committees have called on the government to investigate drug law reform, only to be ignored by whoever was in No.10. And that approach remains in place today. Dame Carol Blacks review of drugs was explicitly barred by the government from considering changes to the existing legislative framework.

It makes no difference who is in power. The policy is the same under Labour or Conservatives. There isnt even any distinction within the parties. For all their differences, and the ferocious infighting that goes with them, you could fit a thin blue Rizla paper between the drug policy of Gordon Brown, Ed Miliband, Jeremy Corbyn and Keir Starmer. The closest we ever got to sense was Tony Blair downgrading cannabis to Class C a decision that was soon reversed.

It doesnt even matter what politicians views were on drug reform before they took office. In 2002, David Cameron was part of the home affairs committee when it recommended a discussion on the possibility of legalisation and regulation. Ten years later, when he was prime minister, he ruled out a suggestion from the very same home affairs committee that there should be a royal commission on drugs. No matter who sits in No.10, the view never changes. People who saw sense magically became impervious to it when in power. And then, like former home secretary Jacqui Smith, rediscover their sense after they have left it.

The curtains stay down, the lights stay off, the war on drugs continues, and all evidence discounting it is rejected.

If we were going to be honest about drugs, we would admit the following six things.

First: you cannot stop people using drugs. People have used drugs for millenia. As far as we can tell, they have done it since the dawn of man. Wherever you find a human activity that cannot be stopped, you are best off trying to regulate it, so that you can minimise harm, instead of trying to outlaw it, which will merely drive it underground.

Second: we should not try to ban drugs, even if we did have a chance of succeeding at it. It is up to people to decide what they want to put in their body. Many drugs are harmful. Even relatively harmless drugs like cannabis can suck the dynamism and ambition out of people. Other drugs, like methamphetamines, are much more dangerous. But in every case, it is peoples right to choose to do it.

Some people find that opinion shocking. And yet they at the same time believe alcohol should be legal. This simply makes no sense. Alcohol can make people violent, damage the body, and be addictive. We respond by helping those who struggle with it, while respecting the decision of those who choose to consume it. The same applies to other drugs and there is no morally consistent position to claim otherwise.

Third: our moral duty as a society is to help people who decide to take drugs. That involves providing addiction services for those who cannot stop, advice for people experimenting, and regulating the market so that drug dealers are prevented from mixing dangerous ingredients in with the active ones.

Fourth: the war on drugs has created a ceaseless grind of broken lives, in which tens of thousands of people are funnelled into prisons for a non-violent crime, where they are brutalised all over again by an under-funded system, and then become more likely to take drugs and commit crime in order to buy them. Even the caution system, which devastates young peoples professional prospects, constitutes a cruel and needlessly vindictive response to a perfectly normal youthful curiosity.

Fifth: the war on drugs ignores the rich while punishing the poor. Look at the government. Around the Cabinet table, prime minister Boris Johnson and minister for the Cabinet Office Michael Gove have admitted taking cocaine, while foreign secretary Dominic Rabb has admitted taking cannabis. Why are they any different from the people currently languishing in prison? Why should they be allowed to treat drugs as youthful high-jinks, when others have their lives ruined by the police response? The answer is because of their class. Overwhelmingly, people from more elevated social backgrounds avoid the brutality of the system, while those from poorer backgrounds do not. As Barack Obama said: Middle-class kids dont get locked up for smoking pot, and poor kids do.

Sixth: the war on drugs is racist. It was from the beginning and it still is today. Black people are stopped and searched for drugs at almost nine times the rate of whites. They are convicted of cannabis possession at 11.8 times the rate, despite having lower rates of self-reported use. As a UN group of human rights experts said in 2019: The war on drugs has operated more effectively as a system of racial control than as a mechanism for combating the use and trafficking of narcotics.

The cruel irony is that the world around us is realising the insanity of the war of drugs, even as Britain stays trapped in its curtains-down, self-imposed blindness. In the US, state after state has experimented with drug reform. The pressure is now building at the federal level, with the House of Representatives voting to pass a bill to decriminalise cannabis late last year. In Europe, several countries are pursuing liberalisation to various degrees, including Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, Norway, the Czech Republic and Germany.

Britain stands increasingly alone, pursuing a deranged fantasy agenda which drives users into danger and money into gangs. The war on drugs cannot be won and it should not be won, even if it could be.

We cant put up with another 50 years of this deranged masquerade. The price in human lives is too steep. But where is the political leader with the bravery, the insight and the backbone to say so? At the moment they are nowhere to be seen. So instead, we stay in our self-imposed madness, keeping the curtains locked down tight, patrolling the light switch, and dismissing anyone who speaks the truth.

Ian Dunt is editor-at-large for Politics.co.uk. His new book,How To Be A Liberal, is out now.

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50 years in, the war on drugs is an unmitigated disaster - Politics.co.uk

A rider that has effectively blocked recreational cannabis for years in Washington, DC appears in President Joe Bidens proposed 2022 budget, which may keep weed on the back burner yet again.

Even though residents of DC voted to legalize possession of recreational marijuana in 2014, the measure has been in limbo since then, derailed by a rider to DCs appropriations bill first introduced by Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), that prohibits the District from spending its local funds on commercialization of recreational cannabis, such as dispensaries. And Bidens proposed 2022 budget includes the riders language yet again.

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) said in a statement she was having a hard time reconciling the Biden administration's support for DC statehood with its budget that would prevent DC from commercializing recreational cannabis. With Democrats controlling the White House, House and Senate, we have the best opportunity in over a decade to enact a D.C. appropriations bill that does not contain any anti-home-rule riders, Norton said.

Asked if the president plans to remove the language from the proposed budget, a Biden administration official said in an email to The Verge that the president continues to strongly support DC statehood, under which the people of DC could make policy choices just like other states.

DC has long had a so-called gray market for marijuana, with medical cannabis legal, and recreational cannabis technically legal, but unable to be taxed or regulated because of the Harris rider. DC voters first approved medical marijuana in 1998, but it too was initially blocked, by the Barr Amendment, legislation that Congress finally overturned in 2009.

Biden, once a leading voice in the War on Drugs of the 1980s and 90s, said during the 2020 presidential campaign that it was time to decriminalize marijuana use, but so far during his administration theres been little action to do so at the federal level. Dozens of US states have legalized medical marijuana, recreational marijuana, or both, and public opinion supporting legal weed is at an all-time high. And Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), and Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Ron Wyden (D-OR), have said they would work together to advance comprehensive cannabis reform.

In February, DC Mayor Muriel Bowser proposed legislation to create an equitable adult-use cannabis program in DC, which would impose a 17 percent tax on cannabis sales. But its unlikely to take effect if the rider remains in Bidens proposed 2022 budget.

Read the rest here:

Bidens proposed budget keeps a block on recreational weed sales in Washington, DC - The Verge

The COVID-19 pandemic has been cataclysmic for much of the planet, and the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes it, is far from finished with us.

After earlier good control of the pandemic, Taiwan, Singapore and other countries are experiencing a surge, and India is facing a catastrophe, with millions of deaths counted already and the nations healthcare system devastated.

In spite of the progress in suppressing the spread of COVID-19 in the U.S., U.K. and some other countries, primarily through remarkably effective vaccines and non-pharmaceutical interventions, such as masking, social distancing, and good hygiene, it seems likely that COVID-19 will not in the foreseeable future completely disappear butwill become endemic, with seasonal variation, similar to influenza.

Because people will continue to fall ill, there will be an ongoing need for treatments, which are currently in short supply.Althoughsome moderately effective drugs are already being used, new treatments are needed to treat severe COVID-19 infections.

The anti-viral drug remdesivir, which binds to the viruss RNA-dependent RNA polymerase and inhibits viral replication, is currently the only drug that is approved by the FDA for the treatment of COVID-19.It is recommended for use in hospitalized patients who require supplemental oxygen.

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The corticosteroid dexamethasone has been found to improve survival in hospitalized patients who require supplemental oxygen, with the greatest benefit observed in patients who are on ventilators.Adding the monoclonal antibody tocilizumab to dexamethasone therapy was found to improve survival among patients who were exhibiting rapid respiratory deterioration due to COVID-19.

In outpatients with mild to moderate COVID-19 who are at high risk for disease progression, anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibody-based therapies may have the greatest potential for a clinical benefit during the earliest stages of infection. For these patients, apanel of NIH experts recommendsadministering monoclonal antibodies bamlanivimab plus etesevimab or casirivimab plus imdevimab, both of which are available through Emergency Use Authorizations (EUAs) from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Other analogous approaches that via various mechanisms blunt the activity of the immune response are promising.

One of these attempts to therapeutically modulate the activity of an often-overlooked system called the lectin pathway, a part of the bodys complement system that helps the immune system respond to infection. When over-activated, as happens with severe COVID-19, it can lead to an uncontrolled cascade of inflammation, endothelial damage, dangerous blood clots, and cytokine storm, whichcan, in turn, lead to severe respiratory distress, organ failure, and death.

Once the coronavirus reaches the lungs, it soon infects the surrounding blood vessels. This triggers a response from part of the immune system called the lectin pathway. The lectin pathway releases an enzyme called MASP-2, which causes uncontrolled inflammation in the blood vessels, further damaging them and leading to thrombosis, or blood clots, in the arteries.

A monoclonal antibody called narsoplimab blocks the MASP-2 enzyme and is, thus, an inhibitor of the lectin-pathway.

It inhibits the binding of cytokine IL-6 to its receptor, and thereby modulates the excessive, damaging inflammatory response of the immune system to infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Narsoplimab has shown impressive responses in advanced clinical trials for several illnesses marked by endothelial cell injury, and because similar pathophysiology is found in COVID-19 infections, ithas been tested in a small number of infected patients, withpromising results.

The largest study, conducted in Italy in six severely ill COVID-19 patients,concluded: (1) [n]arsoplimabdown-modulates SARS-CoV-2-induced activation of the lectin pathway and endothelial cell damage; (2) [n]arsoplimab can reduce the thrombotic risk of Covid-19 patients; and (3) [a]ll patients treated with narsoplimab improved and survived without any drug-related adverse events. This was a far better result than would have been expected, based on retrospective control groups.

Narsoplimab is only one example of the frenzy of clinical research on various treatment protocols for COVID-19, including the use of drugs, new and repurposed.This is critical, especially if new variants of SARS-CoV-2 emerge that are not effectively combated by existing vaccines.

Henry I. Miller is a physician, molecular biologist and senior fellow at the Pacific Research Institute. He was the founding director of the FDAs Office of Biotechnology.

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Industry VoicesVaccines are pivotal in the war on COVID-19, but better treatments for acute COVID patients are critical - FierceHealthcare

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Published June 3rd, 2021 at 6:00 AM

A sharp pain from a recent surgery jolts an elderly woman awake in the middle of the night, and she fights through the fog in her brain to ponder, Did I already take my pain meds?

A young man buys marijuana, but he has no idea that the supplier laced it with the deadly drug fentanyl to enhance the high.

A chronic pain patient has been taking opioids without issues for years, but they develop a respiratory disease and suddenly have a bad reaction to their medication.

These are just a few of the scenarios in which an unwitting person ends up overdosing an occurrence that rose about 27% nationwide from 2019 to 2020.

Missourians know this grief all too well.

A recent study from WalletHub ranked Missouri third in the nation for drug use, behind only the District of Columbia and West Virginia. Kansas is much further down the list at 39th.

The study compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia by gathering 21 relevant metrics that were grouped in three overall categories: drug use and addiction; law enforcement; and drug health issues and rehabilitation. Each state was then assigned a weighted score.

Amid the COVID pandemic, another public health disaster has been looming in the background: the growing opioid crisis.

Dr. Teresa Long is the medical director for the Persistent Pain Management Clinic at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Over the years she has watched the opioid epidemic develop in real time.

A number of years ago there was a lot of teaching that patients should not be feeling any pain, Long said. Many more doctors were willing to give much higher doses (of opioids).

The result of this medical practice was many more people being exposed to opioids than before. While the common conception is that drug dependency starts in the streets, doctors like Long recognize the role that health care practices have played in addiction as well.

Pain management care has changed along with the opioid epidemic. Now, doctors will commonly communicate that pain with procedures should be expected but can be managed with some medication.

Opiates are helpful for the management of pain, but they can be used too frivolously, Long said.

Dr. Roopa Sethi specializes in addiction psychiatry at the University of Kansas Medical Center. Sethi and Long both said that the lines between using a drug, dependency and addiction can become blurred.

This is one of the numerous reasons that people addicted to drugs can have a difficult time identifying the issue.

Addiction doesnt necessarily have a look, Sethi said.

Sethi explained that someone could be using opioids as pain management for years, but a change in dosage or life circumstances could trigger an addiction.

Misconceptions about what addiction looks like have contributed to shame and difficulty coming to grips with the illness.

The war on drugs defined by such imagery as an egg being cracked into a frying pan and gritty cop shows left little nuance in the conversation around the many forms addiction can take.

For example, withdrawal isnt just something that happens when someone is itching to find their next dose. If a pain patient doesnt get their prescription refilled on time, they might start to feel withdrawal symptoms that Sethi described as intolerable.

Those are normal psychological symptoms, Long said.

According to Long, it becomes time to label an addiction when the focus of a persons life starts to revolve around the drug itself getting it, recovering from the use and finding the next dose.

To pharmacist and University of Missouri-Kansas City professor Dr. Heather Lyons-Burney, one of the largest roadblocks to recovery is the stigma around addiction.

The more stigma there is, the less likely people are to seek care, she said.

Lyons-Burney also believes that heavy stigma around drug abuse, particularly in rural areas, is part of the reason that Missouri is ranked so high in drug use.

Its like a chronic illness, she said. Lets treat it that way.

As opposed to treating it like a character flaw, advocates like Lyons-Burney are pushing for education so that more people recognize substance use as a disorder.

Recently, the state of Missouri has been catching up to the rest of the country by adopting measures to address the states drug issue.

After years of being the countrys lone holdout, the Missouri Senate voted this April to create a statewide prescription drug monitoring program. Other states have been using this program in an attempt to prevent drug abuse by tracking drug use.

Also this April, the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services issued a standing order for the opioid overdose reversal drug naloxone. This means that naloxone, a life saving drug, can be issued to qualified candidates without a prescription.

Lyons-Burney says the role of naloxone is paramount. Despite efforts of both doctors and people addicted to drugs to safely move away from opioid use, mistakes happen. And if a relapse occurs after someones tolerance has been lowered, the result can be deadly.

Advocates say Missouris new efforts to treat substance use disorders paired with the work of existing treatment centers hopefully will improve the states rank when it comes to drug abuse.

Its a multi-pronged approach, theres not one solution to this problem, Lyons-Burney said. As a society and as a community we need to stand up and help our neighbors.

Catherine Hoffman covers community affairs and culture for Kansas City PBS in cooperation withReport for America.

Discover more unheard stories about Kansas City, every Thursday.

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Missouri Feels the Pain of Drug Dependency and Overdose More than Most States - Flatland

The Honorable Nancy PelosiSpeaker of the House of Representatives1236 Longworth House Office BuildingWashington, DC 20515

The Honorable Steny HoyerMajority LeaderH-107, The CapitolWashington, DC 20515

The Honorable Kevin McCarthyMinority Leader2468 Rayburn House Office BuildingWashington, DC 20515

Re: Co-sponsor the MORE Act (HR 3617) and Support Swift Passage in the House

Dear Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Hoyer, Minority Leader McCarthy, and Honorable Members of the US House of Representatives:

I write on behalf of Human Rights Watch to urge you to co-sponsor the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act (MORE Act) and support its swift movement to the House floor for a vote this month. Last year, the bill introduced in the 116th Congress by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Representative Jerry Nadler was backed by 120 House co-sponsors and the House of Representatives passed the MORE Act with a 228-164 vote. The passage of the MORE Act represented a landmark step toward a rights-respecting criminal legal system while furthering racial justice and equity. Human Rights Watch again calls upon members of Congress to take the necessary steps to further racial justice by swiftly ending marijuana prohibition and repairing the harm it has caused.

The MORE Act removes marijuana from the Controlled Substances Act and begins to repair the harm marijuana prohibition has caused to millions of people, particularly Black and brown communities, by establishing a fund for social equity programs to reinvest in affected communities. It also would protect noncitizens from immigration consequences due to a cannabis-related event and creates a process by which people with federal marijuana convictions can have these convictions expunged or be resentenced.

Reduce the Role of Policing in and Ending Disproportionate Drug Arrests

In 2016, research by Human Rights Watch and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) showed that in the US, someone was arrested for drug possession for personal useevery 25 seconds, and half of those arrests were for marijuana possession.[1] Drug possession for personal useremainsby far the offense for which people are arrested the most in the United States, with 1.35 million people arrested for drug possession in the United States in 2019.[2] The largest share of drug possession arrests is marijuana-related.

Theracial disparities in these arrests remain acute.[3] Despite using drugs at similar rates as white people, Black adults are more than two-and-a-half times as likely as white adults to be arrested for simple possession. AnApril 2020 ACLU reportfound that in 2018, Black people were 3.64 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than white people.[4] To fundamentally reform policing in the United States, Human Rights Watch calls on Congress to decriminalize the possession of all drugs for personal use and encourage state and local authorities to reduce the role of police in addressing societal problems including substance use disorder.[5]

Ending federal marijuana prohibition would not address criminalization of marijuana or other drugs at the state level, but would remove federal obstacles to state-level marijuana reform and send a powerful signal about the importance of pursuing it.

Protect the Rights of Immigrants and Prevent Family Separation

Marijuana criminalization has played a major role in tearing apart families. In a 2015 report, A Price Too High: US Families Torn Apart by Deportations for Drug Offenses, Human Rights Watch analyzed data received from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in response to a request under the Freedom of Information Act.[6] Between 2007 and 2012 almost 266,000 deported immigrants had a drug conviction as their most serious conviction; of those, over 34,000 were for marijuana possession. Even lawful permanent residents can be deported for marijuana possession. People who use marijuana or work in the marijuana industry in a jurisdiction in which such activities are legal can face deportation for such activities or be barred from ever gaining legal status and citizenship. Due to federal prohibition, a conviction for simple possession of marijuana can trigger mandatory detention provisionspeople who would never face jail time under criminal laws faced months or even years of detention under immigration laws. Many of the people Human Rights Watch interviewed had US citizen family, who also suffered the consequences of these harsh immigration laws. By ending the federal prohibition against marijuana, the MORE Act would end such draconian outcomes and help keep families together.

A Path to Repair and Redress for the Devastating Toll of Marijuana Prohibition

The MORE Act is a bill that will begin to repair harms, particularly in Black, brown, and immigrant communities, as a result of the war on drugs. The bill would direct federal excise tax on marijuana sales toward funding reinvestment in communities adversely impacted by drug prohibition[7] and build up programming to support a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive industry.[8]

For all these reasons, passing the MORE Act represents a real opportunity at the federal level to address racial justice and equity in the US policing and criminal legal system.Human Rights Watch urges you to co-sponsor the MORE Act and support its swift movement to the House floor in June.

Sincerely,

Laura PitterDeputy Director, US ProgramHuman Rights Watch

[1] Human Rights Watch, Every 25 Seconds: The Human Toll of Criminalizing Drug Use (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2016), https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/10/12/every-25-seconds/human-toll-criminalizing-drug-use-united-states.

[2] Common Sense for Drug Policy, Total Annual Drug Arrests in The United States by Offense Type, 2021, https://www.drugpolicyfacts.org/node/234 (accessed April 21, 2021).

[3] Thomas J. Rachko, Jr., US Congress Should End Marijuana Prohibition, commentary, Human Rights Watch Dispatch, August 25, 2020, https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/08/25/us-congress-should-end-marijuana-prohibition.

[4] American Civil Liberties Union, A Tale of Two Countries: Racially Targeted Arrests in the Era of Marijuana, April 16, 2020, https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/new-aclu-report-despite-marijuana-legalization-black-people-still-almost-four-times (accessed April 21, 2020).

[5] Human Rights Watch, A Roadmap for Re-imagining Public Safety in the United States: 14 Recommendations on Policing, Community Investment, and Accountability (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2020), https://www.hrw.org/news/2020/08/12/roadmap-re-imagining-public-safety-united-states.

[6] Human Rights Watch, A Price Too High: US Families Torn Apart by Deportations for Drug Offenses (New York: Human Rights Watch, 2015), https://www.hrw.org/report/2015/06/16/price-too-high/us-families-torn-apart-deportations-drug-offenses.

[7] Marijuana Justice Coalition Asserts Statement of Principles on Federal Marijuana Reform, Human Rights Watch news release, July 9, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/07/09/marijuana-justice-coalition-asserts-statement-principles-federal-marijuana-reform.

[8] US: Bill Seeks to End Federal Marijuana Prohibition, Human Rights Watch news release, July 23, 2019, https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/07/23/us-bill-seeks-end-federal-marijuana-prohibition.

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Human Rights Watch Urges Congress to Support the MORE Act - Human Rights Watch

On this edition of Your Call, we rebroadcast our conversation with award-winning filmmaker Stanley Nelson about his new Netflix documentary, Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy. Nelson looks back on how the crack epidemic of the early 1980s decimated Black and Brown communities.

The epidemic fueled racial and economic inequality, hyper-aggressive policing, mass incarceration, and government corruption at the highest levels. Nelson says we need to expose the truth about the past in order to change policies.

Guest:

Stanley Nelson, Emmy award-winning documentary filmmaker and founder of Firelight Media. Stanley is a MacArthur Genius Fellow and recipient of the National Medal in the Humanities. Some of his films include Freedom Riders, The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution and The Murder of Emmett Till

Web Resources:

Netflix: Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy

The Guardian, Beatrice Loayza: 'The war on drugs funded policing': behind a Netflix documentary about crack

Bloom&Oil, Zack Ruskin: Netflixs Crack Reveals Americas War on Drugs Was Really a War on People

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'Crack: Cocaine, Corruption & Conspiracy' Exposes The Truth About The War On Drugs - KALW

Founded in 1970 in the South Bronx by an alliance between the Black Panther Party, the Young Lords, and other revolutionary groups, Lincoln Detox was an attempt to provide alternative methods of drug addiction treatment. This was just as Nixons War on Drugs was revving up, which was of course in fact a war on poor people by other means on one end its been alleged that intelligence agencies funneled drugs into impoverished areas, while on the other end police incontestably used the presence of drugs as a pretense to brutalize those areas. In between were underfunded, token efforts at care for addicts. Dope Is Death tells the story not just of Lincoln Detox, but also of how that whole generation of activists and freedom fighters were continually attacked by the state for trying to build a different, better world.

Among its holistic attempts at rehabilitating addicts, the center offered experimental methods of treatment like acupuncture (a practice which the film shows successor programs still using today), as well as political education classes. The staff, which included Tupac Shakurs stepfather Mutulu Shakur, sought not merely to wean people off drugs, but to awaken them to the material conditions which caused them to be plagued with addiction in the first place. Whatever one may think of practices like acupuncture, it was certainly those efforts at shared social consciousness that brought the government hammer down on these people, and not any real concerns about public health.

Dope Is Death is available on YouTube and various VOD platforms.

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When the Black Panthers and Young Lords Teamed Up to Fight Addiction with Acupuncture - Hyperallergic

On Thursday, a bill that would decriminalize psychedelic drugs will move forward to a full vote of the California State Senate after passing the Senate Appropriations Committee in a 5-2 vote.

The bill was introduced back in February by Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) which he stated that SB 519 reverses outdated War on Drugs policies criminalizing substances that help treat conditions like depression, anxiety and PTSD. The bill will be heard by June 4th. If passed, it will then move on to the State Assembly.

According to the bill, it would decriminalize the possession and personal use for the following: dimethyltryptamine (DMT), ibogaine (psychedelic substance), ketamine, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), mescaline (psychedelic hallucinogen), psilocybin (magic mushrooms), and 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA, ecstasy, molly) possession for personal use and social sharing.

SB 519 also expunges any criminal records for people convicted of possession or personal use of these substances. And, SB 519 establishes a commission charged with producing recommendations to the Legislature regarding which regulatory system they recommend California adopt regulations for personal use of these specified substances in the future.

This legislation follows similar, successful efforts to decriminalize these substances in Washington, D.C., Oakland, and Santa Cruz, as well as the successful 2020 Oregon ballot measures that decriminalized personal use of all scheduled substances, and authorized the creation of a state-licensed, psilocybin services program over the next two years.

Most of our current drug policies stem from the War on Drugs a failed set of racist policies starting in the early 20th century and accelerating in the 1970s and 1980s, established under the guise of addressing addiction and drug dealing. The War on Drugs, rather than addressing the root causes of substance use disorder and mental illness, instead criminalized addiction and helped create our current system of racist mass incarceration, which disproportionately punishes Black, brown and low-income communities for low-level, nonviolent drug-related offenses. Senator Wiener believes that California needs to ultimately decriminalize all drug use and possession.

Despite their current classification as Schedule I drugs, psychedelics have shown potential in treating mental health issues like depression, anxiety, and PTSD, and have also demonstrated benefits for end-of-life care. According to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), Schedule I drugs have no accepted medical use and high potential for abuse, and possession and use of Schedule I drugs comes with higher penalties than Schedule II or III. Ketamine is the only psychedelic substance classified as Schedule III, and it has now been approved to treat depression. The drug classification system is another relic of the War on Drugs era, is anti-science and criminalizes drug use, even when this approach has clearly failed for the last 50 years.

Recent clinical trials studying MDMA as a treatment for PTSD led the FDA to distinguish MDMA-assisted therapy as a Breakthrough Therapy: two-thirds of study participants no longer qualified as having PTSD after experiencing MDMA-assisted therapy. In a 2018 clinical trial, MDMA treatment showed promise in treating chronic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in military veterans, firefighters, and police officers. In a 2020 study, MDMA used in combination with therapy showed the potential to reduce anxiety in patients facing life-threatening illnesses.

In both 2018 and 2019, the FDA issued Breakthrough Therapy distinction to psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic mushrooms). In two different clinical trials, psilocybin was shown to reduce symptoms in patients with treatment-resistant depression. A John Hopkins study showed a decrease in depression and anxiety in cancer patients using psilocybin, and another showed promise for smoking cessation. There is also research indicating that LSD may be an effective treatment for anxiety and alcoholism. Observational studies have also documented the use of ayahuasca (which contains DMT) and ibogaine as potential treatments for substance use disorder.

A year into the COVID-19 pandemic, our mental health crisis is worsening. With so many dealing with unemployment and financial distress, a lack of community and social interaction, and loss of friends or family to COVID-19 anxiety, depression, overdose and suicide rates are up across the country. And with prisons and jails serving as COVID-19 hotspots, its critical that we look to alternatives to criminalizing and incarcerating people who are using psychedelics to heal. SB 519 is a critical reform that acknowledges the reality of our mental health crisis, the proven potential psychedelics have shown in treating mental illness, and the failure of the current punitive approach to substance use, mental health and public health and safety.

SB 519 is co-sponsored by Heroic Hearts Project, an organization that connects veterans to psychedelic therapy for treating complex trauma. In the past few years, Heroic Hearts has become an international voice for veterans demanding effective mental health treatment options. It is also co-sponsored by Veterans Exploring Treatment Solutions (VETS), an organization working to end the veteran suicide epidemic. VETS provides resources, research, and advocacy for U.S. military veterans seeking psychedelic-assisted therapies for traumatic brain injury (TBI), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), addiction, and other mental health conditions.

SB 519 is co-authored by Assemblymembers Evan Low (D-San Jose) and Sydney Kamlager (D-Los Angeles), and Bill Quirk (D-Hayward).

SB 519 focuses on decriminalization and ending the war on drugs and studying a system for responsible access to psychedelics that maximizes health and safety. SB 519 does not imagine a cannabis model or lay a foundation for retail trade in psychedelics; rather, it proposes to end the failed War on Drugs approach to addressing psychedelics while building on the science and research in the psychedelic field to create the potential for a therapeutic framework that could help people struggling from the effects of depression, anxiety, PTSD, and other health conditions.

Policy should be based on science and common sense, not fear and stigma, said Senator Wiener. The War on Drugs and mass incarceration are destructive and failed policies, and we must end them. Moreover, given the severity of our mental health crisis, we shouldnt be criminalizing people for using drugs that have shown significant promise in treating mental health conditions. People should be able to seek alternative treatment for diseases like anxiety, depression, and PTSD, and we need to make science-based treatments available to those in need. Cities like Washington, D.C. and states like Oregon have led the way, and now its Californias turn.

This bill is part of a larger push to end the failed War on Drugs, which has disproportionately harmed underserved communities of color, said Assemblymember Evan Low. This legislationcould offer scientists opportunities to make groundbreaking progress in understanding how to help people who suffer from anxiety and post-traumatic stress. Our bill helps to lead us on a path to decriminalizing substance abuse so we can focus on providing addiction treatment instead of paying for jail cells and ignoring the larger problem.

We all must come together to stand up for those that have put their lives on the line for this country, said Heroic Hearts Project founder, Jesse Gould. Psychedelic-assisted treatments have the potential to save countless veteran lives and we as American citizens have an obligation to listen to the needs of these warriors.

Veteran healthcare and suicide risk is a national crisis, and we believe that psychedelic treatments with trained faciiltators can help. As an organization that helps connect veterans in need to psychedelic therapy and healing, we have seen first hand the difference it can make in the life of a veteran suffering from trauma, said Veterans Exploring Treatment Options (VETS) co-founder Amber Capone. By passing SB 519, California can take the first step in providing veterans and others access to the psychedelic treatment that has made a profound difference in our lives and the lives of thousands of veterans around the country.

As a brain tumor specialist, many of my patients have malignant brain tumors and ultimately succumb to their illness, said David F. Kelly, M.D., a physician who provides end-of-life care for terminally ill patients. At Pacific Neuroscience Institute we also treat numerous patients with other serious and often terminal neurological disorders including dementia, stroke, Parkinsons disease and multiple sclerosis. As such, I am a strong advocate for the safe and judicious use of psychedelic-assisted therapies in the appropriate setting for patients with chronic and terminal illnesses. There is now ample evidence from clinical trials completed over the last decade showing that psilocybin is safe and remarkably effective in relieving anxiety and depression in this patient population.

We are in a mental health pandemic, and the causes of trauma are multiplying faster than the solutions, said Lauren Taus, LCSW, and a Ketamine-Assisted Therapy practitioner. As a licensed therapist, I have seen how psychedelic assisted therapies can accelerate the healing process and create breakthroughs for people in need when all other methods fail. I currently provide ketamine assisted therapy, and I know that profound transformational changes can happen when trained clinicians use psychedelics in a thoughtful and regulated way. Decriminalization combined with a well structured therapy program can help end the criminalization of healing while creating a true opportunity to provide effective treatment to individuals suffering from depression, anxiety, trauma and countless other mental health conditions.

In 2017, I began working with individuals at the end of their lives who were seeking closure, healing and forgiveness, mostly of themselves, said Kat Kurner, End of Life Guide, who serves on the Decriminalize Nature Council of Elders and is a member of the Cherokee Nation. Psilocybin mushrooms are truly magical when treating end of life anxiety and it has been my honor and privilege to sit with people at this most challenging time of their lives. I work with veterans suffering from PTSD, drug addicts who are trying to heal, and I work with people who are suffering from treatment resistant depression and anxiety. Over the years I have bared witness to the incredible healing powers of our plant allies. To think that I could go to prison for doing the work I do is not only terrifying, its immoral.

Drug decriminalization is a necessary first step to repairing the harms from the decades-long public health disaster of the War on Drugs, said Natalie Lyla Ginsberg, MSW, director of policy & advocacy at the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). Criminalization has failed to deter drug use over the last 50 years, drug use has actually increased. However, in countries like Portugal where drug policies have shifted from a criminal justice to a public health centered approach, drug-related deaths and illnesses have dropped dramatically.

Psychedelic use can come with some risks, but criminalization only increases those risks by creating an unregulated market in which difficult-to-verify dosages and the presence of adulterants like fentanyl threaten public health, said Ismail Lourido Ali, JD, policy & advocacy counsel at MAPS. Decriminalizing harm reduction interventions like substance analysis may save lives with its potential to prevent accidental overdoses.

Psychedelics, with proper guidance and under the right conditions have the potential to help heal great psychological and spiritual harms, especially within marginalized communities, said Ayize Jama, M.Div, M.A., M.F.A, and Chief Members Steward at the Sacred Garden Community Church in Oakland. The continued criminalization of substances that prove more effective in dealing with intergenerational and systemic trauma than pharmaceuticals seems to be the real crime. As an African-American community minister and a therapist, Ive borne witness to entheogens providing succor and solace to former military members, former substance abusers, those suffering from depression, and those in need of hospice care. The sooner decriminalization comes, the sooner we can start looking at how to respectfully and earnestly use entheogens to help in healing our disenfranchised communities.

We applaud Senator Wiener for his introduction to SB 519, which will decriminalize the personal possession and use of entheogenic plants and fungi, said Decriminalize Nature National Board Chair Carlos Plazola. The legislation has a strong focus on ensuring social justice and equitable access for traditionally marginalized communities, while enabling multiple modalities for mental health treatment.

(*Due to habitat loss, illegal poaching, and other cultural and environmental reasons, peyote is a threatened and protected species. SB 519 will not decriminalize peyote and does not decriminalize mescaline that is sourced from peyote.)

Information provided by Senator Scott Wiener press release in February

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Bill to Decriminalize Possession and Personal Use of Psychedelics Headed for Full Senate Vote - EastCountyToday