Friendly Fire | Page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

FIGHTING A LOSING BATTLE

Perhaps there is no problem. Perhaps, some might argue, we don't need a new anti-drug strategy. That's certainly what White House drug czar General Barry McCaffrey says in the 1999 National Drug Control Strategy. There is no bigger claim in that glossy 138-page report, where big red letters splashed across two-pages proclaim that our "National Anti-Drug Policy is Working." In Congressional testimony in March 2000, McCaffrey reiterated that "we are winning" the war on drugs.

But the facts suggest otherwise. Overdose-type deaths from cocaine, heroin, stimulants, depressants, and hallucinogens&emdash;just shy of 16,000 in 1997&emdash;have steadily climbed for two decades, and are now twice the 7,101 deaths reported in 1979. Illegal drugs such as heroin and marijuana were more easily available to high school seniors in 1998 than at any time in history. Prices for heroin and cocaine are near their historic lows, suggesting that traffickers are continuously discounting the risks and costs they face from law enforcement. This while the purity of those drugs in the street is near historic highs, which indicates that traffickers are actually competing for market share, and thriving.

Not only are we not succeeding, we are failing to merely hold steady. On the most important criteria&emdash;saving lives, keeping drugs out of the hands of kids, hindering illegal drug traffickers, and treating those who are addicted&emdash;the failure of our current strategies is escalating.

At the same time, the number of addicts needing treatment&emdash;the most effective way to reduce the costs and severity of the drug problem by reducing the number of hard core addicts&emdash;has been increasing, yet we are failing to significantly increase our treatment capacity. Almost three million hard core drug addicts remain untreated each year. "[Drug] treatment reduces about 10 times more serious crime than conventional enforcement and 15 times more than mandatory minimums," according to a detailed RAND Corporation analysis. In another study, commissioned by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) and the U.S. Army, RAND found that treatment is 20 times more cost-effective than source eradication. Yet it is the dimension that our drug strategy most profoundly fails to address. The people who most need our help are not getting it.

Not only are we not succeeding, we are failing to merely hold steady. On the most important criteria&emdash;saving lives, keeping drugs out of the hands of kids, hindering illegal drug traffickers, and treating those who are addicted&emdash;the failure of our current strategies is escalating. Meanwhile, our expenditures have grown enormously, meaning we're actually paying to achieve this failure. Federal expenditures have increased from $683 million in 1975 to $17.7 billion in 1999 (see chart). The federal government will spend at least $18.4 billion this year, and $19.2 billion has been requested for 2001. In 1995, over $33 billion was spent by State and local governments to fight drugs, a sum that also grows steadily.

There is no doubt that use and abuse of drugs such as cocaine, heroin, amphetamines, and depressants present serious problems to societies around the world. The criminal traffic in drugs generated about $63 billion in criminal income in the U.S. in 1999. And while the economic value of the social costs of drug abuse is hard to accurately estimate, one 1995 estimate set the total cost from premature death, illness and the costs to crime victims at $77 billion. Urinalyses of persons arrested for crimes in 1998 show evidence of some illegal drug use at rates ranging from 60 to 80 percent, depending upon the city.

The personal costs are just as great. Hard core users of illegal drugs spend most of their time looking for money to buy drugs (which remain extremely expensive), finding the drugs in illegal markets, ingesting them, and enduring the effects of their drug use. The time available for constructive labor, for family and domestic responsibilities, and for healthy pursuits is nearly non-existent. Hard core users typically live in a world of pain, domestic chaos, contagious disease, ill-health, degradation, self-loathing and crime.

Yet it is that last word&emdash;crime&emdash;which receives both the headlines and the bulk of legislative, judicial and law enforcement attention when it comes to the drug crisis facing our country. The anti-drug effort is overwhelmingly an effort of police, prisons and, outside the United States, the military, intelligence agencies, and other law enforcement agencies.