Drugs
Is Single Convention 1961 for Drug Control - Void?
Mind altering substances may have been around before humans and they show no inclination to leave for the planet Mars, though humans may wish they do. Their place is firmly set in our midst. We could not eradicate them when they were a few (or rather the then identified few) and needed Mother Earth to make their presence felt, it is foolhardy to hope to eradicate them now, when mind altering chemicals are born in labs, and synthetic products are competing successfully with their natural counterparts to be a preferred choice of users.
The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs 1961 and the subsequent drug conventions (1) offered a conceptual framework for Member States to enforce and address their domestic drug situation, whether it was relevant to their specific reality or not. Since then the media has been getting regular news to cover on the growing aspirations of those who believe one day the world will be free from drugs. Others who believe decriminalization/ legalisation is the only rational way forward have caught the attention of media rather haphazardly. The public preyed upon with diverse perspectives to drug control, remain unclear on who would in the long run give them a respite from war on drugs, for none have stated the basic truth, drugs are here to stay and we have to learn to deal with it.
Drug conventions achieved something very few other conventions could, drug conventions got significant number of Member States to be signatories. While this can be upheld as a positive measure towards strengthening global governance, the question to be asked is what is the legitimacy of a centralized and uniform format for drug polices across Member States and did it attain its stated goal to control drug use through penal sanctions and drug treatment, and will uniform norms lead to a uniformity in drug of choice across Member States and implications of the same.
Is Drug Policy in a flux or is a different shade of criminalization being planned for?
Our association with mind altering substances has rarely remained static or uniform across the globe or within any given region. The United Nations sought to control this complex, diverse and intricate human association through its various global conventions, beginning with the Single Convention 1961 as the base; and State members were bound to follow the set path without much room for change (1,2).
But, despite all of its efforts it could neither rein in the drug problem nor ensure that a uniform drug policy led to the synthesis of uniform associations with mind altering substances, across the globe. In many countries a minor shift in drug policy occurred when drugs users became very vulnerable to HIV infection, initiating harm minimization measures for users who injected drugs. The harm minimization strategy included, provision of safe needle and syringes, opioid agonist therapy (OST) to users in the community and to addicted prison population, setting up of a room for safe consumption of drugs in the community, and user peers carrying community outreach work. While that gained acceptance in Europe, US and other countries across the globe in varying degrees, countries in Asia (Japan, Laos, Phillippines, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka), countries in Middle East and North Africa (Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, UAE, Yemen), all parts of Oceania (except for Australia and New Zealand), many countries in Latin America, Sub-Saharan and West Africa. kept away from this change (3). The decriminalization of cannabis use was another measure taken up by certain countries (4). At the global level out of 206 countries, only 86 countries have needle and syringe programme and 84 countries opioid agonist therapy (OST) and these are countries in Eurasia, North America and Western Europe. No country has adopted as a whole all of the initiatives considered part of harm reduction efforts (3).
Drug policy, today, is located at a crucial juncture, where profile change is a must but it is far more evasive than what individuals Read More
Drugs, Altered States of Consciousness & Us-
Implications for Drug Policy
Centuries have gone by and yet we struggle in our waltz with Mind Altering Substances (MAS), our steps still falter and a probable safe distance evades our grasp. The yesteryears centered around finding mind altering substances in nature, from far and near; now we hone our skills in identifying the right chemicals or the means of manipulating molecular formations for creating MAS within kitchen labs or in the pharmaceutical industry. The presence of numerous substances to choose from has apparently not satiated user demand nor dampened the passion of enforcement agencies to exterminate the 'enemy'.Read More