[Nursie]

How were they helped by the drugs being illegal?

I know this is a little bit of a canard and what people really mean is "I don't want to see more people go that way", but it strikes me that there is a need to separate these two things -

1. Some drugs, particularly opiates, are a bad thing to get into.

2. Therefore banning them and criminalising use is the right thing to do and the best way to stop more bad stuff.

Personally I think a system which decriminalises possession of hard drugs and legalises their distribution from (or use at) a well regulated medical centre would be a good thing, from a harm-reduction viewpoint. But I'd agree that not everything should be as easy to get as a can of beer.

[mc32]

I definitely agree with the treatment centers. Professionals should be able to treat addicts with the best methods possible and we should not have laws getting in the way of those treatments. Still not sold on decriminalizing any "recreational" distribution. Small use possession yes.

[Nursie]

Distribution maybe not, but possession certainly. Criminalising addiction hasn't gone very well for us so far.

--edit-- now realise we're not arguing!

I'm not sure, with heroin for instance, where recreation ends and addiction begins. By having it freely available (with a side-order of counselling and you have to take it on-site) we could reduce harm from bad needles, impure drugs etc etc. We would also reduce crime as nobody then needs to rob people to get their next fix - they can get it. In what little I've read about where this is the prevalent method (Switzerland) addicts are often able to function normally and even reduce usage quite rapidly, when the stress of finding the money and the contacts for the next hit is taken out of the equation.

It seems like a good thing to do, to me.