Pubdate: Sun, 16 Jul 2000
Source: Amarillo Globe-News (TX)
Copyright: 2000 Amarillo Globe-News
Contact:  P.O. Box 2091, Amarillo, TX 79166
Fax: (806) 373-0810
Website: http://amarillonet.com/
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Author: John Kanelis

DRUG LEGALIZATION ISN'T COST-FREE

Remember the television commercial that showed an egg frying in a pan, with 
the announcer's grim narration, "This is your brain on drugs"?

It didn't take a public service announcement to convince me that doing 
drugs is a profoundly bad lifestyle choice.

That said, I continue to be amazed at those who suggest that drug 
legalization somehow would produce less of a drain on society than the 
current war on drugs.

These folks blow my mind - so to speak.

The drug legalization argument breaks down quickly, in my mind, when 
proponents suggest that it wouldn't cost the government any more to treat 
the issue as a "medical problem" rather than a "law-enforcement problem."

Does easier access to legal drugs, such as heroin and cocaine, create more 
drug addicts? How can it not produce such an outcome?

"There can be no doubt that it would increase addiction," said Ron Owens, 
an associate professor of psychiatry at the Texas Tech Health Sciences 
Center in Amarillo. Owens is a psychologist who has treated "lots of drug 
abusers" in his day.

"Legalization would be catastrophic," he said. "It would create a drug 
industry that I believe would dwarf the pharmaceutical industry we have 
today." Owens believes companies would begin "research into determining how 
to make the drugs that give the user the best buzz for the buck."

Does legalization cost less than the current system of incarcerating drug 
offenders? I suppose it would - if you didn't spend a nickel caring for 
someone who fried his or her brain like the egg in that commercial. Who, 
though, is going to allow our civilized society to let someone abuse heroin 
or some other hard drug without offering some help in return? Who among us 
would condone letting people sleep literally in the street, or in our 
public parks? Or who would allow the run-of-the-mill addict to stumble 
aimlessly along our streets, panhandling passers-by for a little drug money 
so they can purchase their next fix at some community clinic?

The cost is there. And it is huge. It would cost us all to pay for publicly 
supported drug counseling and rehabilitation. It also would cost us all to 
support those who, for whatever reason, cannot shake themselves of the drug 
habit. Those who cannot sustain themselves must rely on others - such as 
you and me.

"If you had psychoactive becoming legal," said Owens, "you'd have so many 
more drugs coming on that you couldn't keep up" with trying to find 
treatments. "It would be a huge drain on the economy to try."

OK, so we don't spend tons of cash on jails under a drug-legalization 
scenario. The government, though, is hardly going to be swimming in cash 
because it isn't paying police officers to arrest drug dealers down on the 
corner. Society is going to "reinvest" those savings in the myriad 
drug-treatment programs spawned by a system that makes every drug under the 
sun available through legal means.

"Start with health care," said Owens, "and the cost of treating overdoses 
and counteracting the other effects of drug abuse. Then you have to deal 
with lost productivity, and then you have to deal with the consequences of 
behavior, such as car crashes.

"And then you have to deal with what happens to the children" born to women 
who would abuse legal drugs, said Owens.

Is the current "war on drugs" working? Not by a long shot. The government 
is arresting plenty of drug dealers - and users - only to find plenty more 
where they came from.

Educators and parents clearly need to do more to imbue in our young people 
that drug use is an inherently dangerous endeavor. Indeed, one cannot have 
too much awareness of those dangers.

The antidote to the current system, however, is not legalization. It is 
time for the drug-legalization crowd to stop implying that such an endeavor 
is cost-free. As Ron Owens said, "We could lose a generation."

John Kanelis is editorial page editor for the Amarillo Globe-News. He can 
be contacted at the Globe-News, P.O. Box 2091, Amarillo, Texas 79166, or 
via e-mail at  ---
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