[DIV28] [] !!! The Purpose Of Statements On Drugs By Politicians <fwd>

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THE PURPOSE OF STATEMENTS ON DRUGS BY POLITICIANS

By Freek Polak

This column appeared in: Vlugschrift of 27.11.99, an internet-weekly of the

Partij van de Arbeid (the Social-Democratic Party, the largest party in the

Netherlands coalition government)

Recently, European Union president Prodi allegedly said, " it is

unacceptable that XTC and other drugs from the Netherlands are exported to

Italy and kill young people. " Also, Prodi allegedly called for the

harmonization of national drug policies within the European Union. This

caused a brief media hype in the Netherlands but when checked, it became

clear that Prodi never made these statements.

However, even if Prodi did not make these accusations, it is important to

openly contradict and refute them since they are part of the core

repertoire of false accusations against our drug policy, for instance by

French president Chirac and American drug czar general McCaffrey.

Even before the report was checked, the reaction of several Dutch

politicians expressed an understanding that Chirac and Prodi were concerned

about the Dutch drug policy because of its negative effects on their

voters. The open European borders, so they said, bring Dutch cannabis and

'designer drugs' within easy reach of the French and Italian youth.

This argument makes no sense. If Dutch drugs can create such serious

problems in Italy and France, then why are there less of those problems in

the Netherlands? The drugs that allegedly cause such disastrous effects are

not only less hard to come by in the Netherlands, they are cheaper too.

Yet, if one compares the public health statistics, there are less

problematic drug users and less first time users in various groups of the

Dutch population than in France and Italy. Also, the users' health is far

better. The Dutch figures are around the European average, while those of

Italy and France are higher. Remarkably, Italy and France have never

officially contradicted these figures.

Can a policy with positive results in the Netherlands have harmful results

at long-distance in other countries?

It seems a paradoxical situation: less drug dependence in the Netherlands

under a less repressive system. But the paradox is only apparent. There is

a logical explanation: the so-called War on Drugs in effect guarantees the

illegal trade in drugs as well as promoting the unsafe consumption of those

drugs. The net result of the more tolerant climate in the Netherlands is a

public health situation superior to that of the countries criticizing us.

Why do politicians make misleading statements about the Netherlands? They

do so for internal political purposes, as an example may demonstrate.

McCaffrey visited the Netherlands in July 1998 on a 'fact finding mission'.

Already before his arrival, he stated to the press that the Dutch drug

policy was a failure. To support this claim he alleged that the murder rate

in the Netherlands was double of that in the United States. " That's drugs, "

he said. This verifiable nonsense was targeted directly to the American

public. McCaffrey got away with it because he knew that the American media

would reproduce it without question. Several people, including the

Netherlands ambassador to the United States, wrote to newspapers with facts

disproving McCaffrey's statements. The media attention, however, had

already shifted to new topics.

This example illustrates how politicians attain their goal of discrediting

the Netherlands drug policy. They are faced with the problem that the more

tolerant Dutch policy has better results and is repeatedly held up as an

example in the scientific literature. But it is not their intention that

their citizens should find out about this. Drug prohibition is not only a

very useful instrument for politicians and their bureaucracies, it is also

a very profitable occupation for many civil servants.

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Freek Polak is a psychiatrist and member of the board of the Netherlands

Drug Policy Foundation.

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