Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr.Coffee
Yeah I didn’t: don’t mean it like that. I agree the deaths are not entirely attributable to decriminalization. I just reported the stat that CBC used in their article and I do think those deaths are more numerous with decriminalization.
I guess ultimately my question would be, to what extent does making it illegal stop deaths from drug use? If it is any at all, then it’s worth making illegal.
But to more clearly articulate my position, I believe Canada needs to do what seems to have worked and that is mirror Portugal’s policy. I’ve said this for awhile now. I don’t understand how a country has made huge strides and then we don’t think we should just copy that model, and part of that model involves some level of arrest / incarceration to get people clean and then put in way more resources into rehab and detoxification and therapy and training for jobs, etc.
Not just arrest and then fire them back out on the street after a few hours, as if that will do anything effective.
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The tl;dr response to this is that incarceration presents a number of obstacles to recovery and can actually lead to death for many reasons (e.g. lack of appropriate staff knowledge and facilities for detox/withdrawal).
There are also very distinct differences between the situations in Portugal and Canada that make it very difficult to mirror their policies. I've explained some of these already in this thread, but I'm tired of repeating myself.
I will say that I'm happy to answer people's questions about this issue over PM if they want to shoot me a message, but I'm gonna bow out of the general discussion I think for my own mental health.