Prohibition might have a point …
11 March 2013
My comment to this article was not published, so I post it here: article in question The article argues for the legalization of drugs, I don’t think thats a good idea.
What about substance induced psychosis? Why is this problem always ignored in this kind of discussions ?
The war on drugs might be a failure; but the cost of having to deal with psychotic / schizophrenic patients might well blow up the health system. Aren’t you willfully misguiding the public by ignoring this problem?”
From: PSYCHOSIS WITH COEXISTING SUBSTANCE MISUSE ASSESSMENT AND MANAGEMENT IN ADULTS AND YOUNG PEOPLE / National Clinical Guideline Number 120” Link
To date, no single UK study has attempted to estimate the combined total healthcare and societal costs of treating people with psychosis and coexisting substance misuse. In 2007, the total health service costs of severe mental illness (schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and related conditions) were estimated at £3.8 billion while the total costs of lost employment were estimated at £5.4 billion (McCrone et al., 2008). Based on UK-based estimates of prevalence rates of between 36 and 44% for people with coexisting substance misuse (Menezes et al., 1996; Weaver et al., 2003), it is possible that the total annual health service and productivity costs of psychosis and substance misuse could be between £3.3 and £4 billion. However, further empirical research is required to assess the true economic burden of psychosis and substance misuse in the UK.
It turns out that British English is a bit confused about numbers; so I don’t know how much money they are talking about:
From Oxford Dictionaries
In British English, a billion used to be equivalent to a million million (i.e. 1,000,000,000,000), while in American English it has always equated to a thousand million (i.e. 1,000,000,000). British English has now adopted the American figure, though, so that a billion equals a thousand million in both varieties of English.
But it sounds like a lot of money, and legalization of pot would not help with that figure.
The Chinese have fought two wars against the West over the prohibition of Opium ; China lost resulting in what it regards as the Century of Humiliation . So the health issues involved probably have some wider implications, besides the cost of treatment.