A Changing Drug War
When President George W. Bush talks of fighting the drug war, he often stresses the need to lower supply abroad while eliminating demand at home. But, for the rest of the world, that distinction is becoming increasingly blurred. The United Nation’s World Drug Report 2000 reveals that the divide between consumer and producer countries no ...
When President George W. Bush talks of fighting the drug war, he often stresses the need to lower supply abroad while eliminating demand at home. But, for the rest of the world, that distinction is becoming increasingly blurred. The United Nation's World Drug Report 2000 reveals that the divide between consumer and producer countries no longer holds true, with more than 130 nations and territories in both the developed and developing worlds reporting a major drug-abuse problem. Drug trafficking routes have also globalized, with the number of countries reporting seizures up from 120 in 1980-81 to 170 in 1997-98.
When President George W. Bush talks of fighting the drug war, he often stresses the need to lower supply abroad while eliminating demand at home. But, for the rest of the world, that distinction is becoming increasingly blurred. The United Nation’s World Drug Report 2000 reveals that the divide between consumer and producer countries no longer holds true, with more than 130 nations and territories in both the developed and developing worlds reporting a major drug-abuse problem. Drug trafficking routes have also globalized, with the number of countries reporting seizures up from 120 in 1980-81 to 170 in 1997-98.
The U.N. reports that global production of heroin and cocaine has shrunk, with coca and poppy cultivation at their lowest levels since the late 1980s. But regional statistics sometimes reveal a different story. For instance, although the White House National Drug Policy Office issued a statement in January congratulating Bolivia and Peru for reducing coca production by more than 60 percent during the last five years, the Organization of American States’ Evaluation of Progress in Drug Control: Hemispheric Report 1999-2000 finds that the total cultivated area of coca crops in the region remained pretty much the same between 1990 and 2000 (thanks to an expansion in Colombia).
The picture, however, is not entirely bleak. The U.N. notes that drug prevention and treatment programs have been very successful in countries such as the United States, where drug consumption fell by 40 percent between 1985 and 1999. But, given that such programs carry a price tag of billions of dollars per year, the looming question in the next phase of the drug war might not be who will fight it, but who will put up the money to treat the world’s estimated 180 million abusers who are its casualties.
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