Several attempts at reviewing the current Ghanaian PNDC Law 236 were made from 2006 to 2015. The latest attempt, despite a second reading of the bill in parliament, was unfortunately unsuccessful due to the 2016 parliamentary and presidential elections. Fortunately, giving the momentum and extent of the discussion on the bill before of the election, as well as the stage it had reached in the parliament, the new government has prioritised the passing of the new law. It is within this context that the Narcotic Control Board (NACOB) held a stakeholder meeting as a key component of the process.

The overall objective of the 2- days consultative meeting was to discuss the proposals contained in the bill as well as to take the views of various stakeholders to ensure that the new bill responds to national and regional realities. The meeting was held at Alisa Hotel, Accra, Ghana from the 19th to 20th July 2017. Law reform processes in the sub region have been hindered by claims from civil society organisations and the public for being left out of the conversations although they form part of the primary beneficiary of the law. So therefore, any sustainable and efficient law should encompass the views of all entities and individuals who gain or lose in its implementation or enforcement. By holding such a meeting, Ghana provides an excellent example to other African countries, demonstrating best practices in the law reform process. The stakeholder meeting gathered a wide range of participants made up of representatives from the Police, the judiciary service, psychiatrists, civil society groups, the international partners (USAID, Rep of US Embassy, The German Embassy, UNODC, etc) , the national law enforcement agencies, students associations, West Africa Drug Policy Network (WADPN – Ghana Chapter), International Drug Policy Consortium African Consultant in Ghana, Recovery Ghana Consortium and Ghana Education Service. Before the clause by clause discussions, civil society representatives were given the opportunity to make a presentation on their position on some key aspects of the bill. The Africa Consultant for International Drug Policy Consortium and a member of the West Africa Drug Policy Network started her presentation by noting that the punitive approach to the war on drugs have caused lots of damage to society and families. She therefore called on stakeholders to see drug use as a public health issue in line with the global call for a paradigm shift from the heavily punitive approach to a humane approach as outlined in the outcome document of the United Nations General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) 2016.

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Ghana in the process of reforming its drug law

People who use drugs are dying in increasing numbers. There are more than 200,000 drug-related deaths a year. Overdose deaths contribute to between a third and a half of all drug-related deaths. Last year, in the United States alone, overdose deaths exceeded 59,000. Overdose is the principal cause of death of North Americans younger than fifty years old. Not cancer; not heart attack or stroke; not vehicular accidents. Overdose. Avoidable overdose.

The vast majority of those who have died in the last several years have overdosed as a result of mistakenly taking fentanyl or carfentanyl instead of heroin and other opiates, with these newer, far stronger drugs increasingly being consumed due to the unregulated drug market under prohibition. Fentanyl is also causing increasing numbers of opiate overdoses and deaths throughout Europe and in other parts of the world. Meanwhile, young people have continued to die the world over as a result of toxic adulterants and contaminants being present in stimulants like MDMA and ecstasy, which are relatively very safe drugs when uncontaminated and when of known strength.

INPUD statement: drug users remembrance day

Our movie gives you an overview of the crisis of harm reduction programs in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where harm reducers don't receive support from the government but they keep doing their work and saving lives.

When we visited the drop-in centre in Zenica, an industrial town in Bosnia-Herzegovina, I could hardly believe what I saw. The centre has an unusual neighbour, a kindergarten, that shares the building with a program that provides clean needles and syringes for injecting drug users. Downstairs, you see children’s drawings on the wall. Upstairs, you see HIV prevention posters. When I asked Denis Dedajic, the head of the program, to explain how can this be possible, he simply shrugged his shoulders. "For all these years, we never had any problems or incidents with them," he said. Good cooperation with the local community is one of the key elements of success for a harm reduction program.

Our clients are our mission - Harm reduction in Bosnia

La regolamentazione giuridica delle droghe è più efficace e giusta del proibizionismo. Ma davvero può risolvere tutti i problemi? No, se non c’è giustizia sociale.

“Fermate la guerra alle droghe e legalizzatele!”. Sempre più persone si identificano con questo messaggio. Io sono un forte sostenitore della necessità di una riforma delle politiche sugli stupefacenti. Ritengo infatti che sia immorale punire qualcuno perché fa uso di droghe. Sono convinto che un mercato legale e regolamentato, a seconda di ogni specifico tipo di droga e dei rischi correlati, abbia molti più benefici per l’umanità che non il mercato nero.

Non mi piace il proibizionismo perché offre una soluzione ipersemplicistica ad un problema complesso. Eppure, io ritengo che il presupposto per cui la legalizzazione delle droghe risolverebbe ogni problema sia allo stesso modo ipersemplicistico. Non mi fraintendete, molti problemi che incontriamo in questo campo sono direttamente collegati alla guerra alle droghe, per esempio l’affollamento delle carceri, le infezioni, l’overdose e il crimine organizzato. Il mercato nero delle droghe è come una bestia nutrita ed ingrassata dagli sforzi che si fanno per reprimerlo. La legalizzazione delle droghe, al contrario, farebbe morire di fame quella bestia.

Mantenere up-to-date con gli sviluppi politici droga iscrivendoti al IDPC mensile Alert.

La legalizzazione delle droghe può risolvere tutti i problemi?

The legal regulation of drugs is more effective and just than prohibition. But does it really fix most problems? Not without social justice.

"Stop the Drug War and Legalise Drugs!" - More and more people identify with this message. I am a strong supporter of drug policy reform myself. I believe that it is immoral to punish someone for using drugs. I am convinced that a regulated legal market, adjusted to specific types of drugs and risky behaviours, is much more beneficial for humankind than a global black market.

I don't like prohibition because it proposes an over-simplistic solution to a complex problem. However, I feel that arguments based on the assumption that legalising drugs will fix most problems are just as over-simplistic. Don't get me wrong, several problems we experience in this field are directly connected to the war on drugs, including over-incarceration, infections, overdoses, and organised crime. The black market of drugs is like a beast which is fed and fattened by efforts to repress it. Legally regulating drugs, on the other hand, would starve the beast.

But simply legalising drugs will not kill all the beasts.

Can legalising drugs fix all problems?

In 2014, the debilitating effects of punitive drug laws across West Africa triggered an urgent need for reforms grounded on human rights and public health. This call for reform was timely as the precarious situation threatened good governance, peace and stability, economic growth and public health in West Africa, a region that is still emerging from decades of violent conflict and economic instability.

The West Africa Commission on Drugs (WACD), in its 2014 report titled, 

Not Just in Transit: Drugs, the State and Society in West Africa

, openly called for the decriminalisation of drug use and possession for personal use. The report provided evidence to show that criminalisation of drug use worsens health and social problems, puts undue pressure on the criminal justice system and fosters corruption.

The 2016 United Nations General Assemblies Session (UNGASS) provided an opportunity for various stakeholders to evaluate and adjust their current drug policies to ensure that it responds to national and regional realities. Before the UNGASS, the West Africa Drug Policy Network (WADPN) supported by the West Africa Civil Society Institute (WACSI) and Open Society Initiative for West Africa (OSIWA) organised national and regional multi-sectoral forums to facilitate a candid discourse on drug policy in West Africa.

West Africa reform agenda looks to decriminalise drug use

China and the United States rarely agree. Whereas the U.S. has threatened to bomb North Korea, China considers the hermit kingdom a troublesome but worthwhile ally. The U.S. has tried to outmaneuverChinese warships in the East and South China Seas to thwart the expansionist ambitions of East Asia’s largest country; China has launched countless cyberattacks on the U.S., which has long armed Taiwan, the Chinese province turned sovereign state. When the U.S. criticized China for abusing human rights, China rebranded the War on Terror as a way to extinguish activism and secessionism among Muslims in Xinjiang. Tibetans, who inhabit another province with a secessionist history, have many friends in the United States. It may surprise many observers of the Sino–American relations to read, then, that China and the U.S. have a mutual interests in pursuing the War on Drugs, a controversial American enterprise.

“The competition between the U.S. and China doesn’t mean there can’t be cooperation on combating opiates and opioids,” noted Jeffrey Higgins, a former supervisory special agent in the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

“China has a growing drug problem, despite its draconian drug laws. This gives China a compelling interest in collaborating with any country to combat drugs.”

China-US cooperation and the new opium war

The Upper House has approved a bill to amend the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Law of 1993 that would effectively decriminalise drug use in Burma.

According to the legislation as amended, drug users would no longer be punished with often-lengthy jail sentences and would be required to perform community service instead. The Ministry of Home Affairs has said it will tackle issues of narcotics use and addiction in accordance with whatever terms the amended law ultimately stipulates, should it see passage through both houses of Parliament.

“It has been approved [by the Upper House] that offences under the law have been changed to community service. The amended law is the most suitable one, since MPs and experts have contributed to the comprehensiveness of it,” said Major-General Aung Soe, the deputy minister for Home Affairs. “In the implementation of every law, there may be both strengths and weaknesses. We [the Ministry of Home Affairs] will undertake enforcement measures as stipulated by the law.”

Upper House moves to decriminalise some drug offences in Myanmar

Malaysia is set to repeal legislation that imposes a mandatory death penalty for people who sell drugs, despite most of its neighbouring countries implementing increasingly brutal drug policies.

On August 8, Minister Azalina Othman Said tweeted to corroborate a story in the press: Malaysia’s cabinet had "agreed to amend the colonial-era Dangerous Drugs Act of 1952 to give courts a choice in sentencing". Under current legislation, anyone found guilty of trafficking drugs faces a mandatory death penalty; the planned reform would give judges discretion in sentencing. While the proposed amendment has support from the cabinet, it must first be tabled in the parliament, which is expected to pass it in October, The Australian reports.

As TalkingDrugs reported in 2016, Malaysia seems to have placed a “secret moratorium” on the execution of people for drug offences for several years. Despite executing 229 people for drug offences between 1983 and 2013, Malaysia is not believed to have executed anyone for such an offence since then. Numerous people have, however, been 

to death for drug trafficking, but the executions have not taken place.

Malaysia’s planned drug reform highlights divide in SE Asia's drug war approach

On Friday 14th July, the Government published its new Drug Strategy: ‘2017 Drug Strategy’. The previous drug strategy, published in 2010, was heavily criticised for its almost exclusive focus on abstinence, and total de-prioritisation of harm reduction initiatives.

This briefing, endorsed by eight of the UK’s leading harm reduction and drug treatment organisations, looks at whether the focus on harm reduction has improved under the new strategy, and discusses challenges in the funding environment which will have a disproportionate impact on harm reduction services.

Still no harm reduction? A critical review of the UK government’s new drug strategy

One of the main targets in the war on drugs could well become a drug to treat the scars of war. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has designated 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), better known as the illegal drug ecstasy, a "breakthrough therapy" for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a status that may lead to faster approval.

The agency has also approved the design for two phase III studies of MDMA for PTSD that would be funded by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), a nonprofit in Santa Cruz, California. MAPS announced the "breakthrough therapy" designation, made by FDA on 16 August, on its website today; if the group can find the money for the trials, which together could cost an estimated $25 million, they may start next spring and finish by 2021.

That an illegal dancefloor drug could become a promising pharmaceutical is another indication that the efforts of a dedicated group of researchers interested in the medicinal properties of mind-altering drugs is paying dividends. Stringent drug laws have stymied research on these compounds for decades. "This is not a big scientific step," says David Nutt, a neuropsychopharmacologist at Imperial College London. "It’s been obvious for 40 years that these drugs are medicines. But it’s a huge step in acceptance."

All clear for the decisive trial of ecstasy in PTSD patients

This was the stark message written across dozens of protest signs held aloft by drug users and their allies at the opening ceremony of Harm Reduction International’s 25th Conference in Montreal in May. The target for the message was Canadian Minister of Heath, Dr Jane Philpott, who was a keynote speaker at our event. With almost 2,500 recorded deaths in Canada in 2016 linked to overdose - afigure thought to be conservative given existing gaps in data - the protesters called on the Minister to declare a national public health emergency that would enable swift action to save lives. Indeed the Canadian overdose crisis is escalating in intensity, with estimates that the province of British Columbia alone might see 1,400 overdose deaths in 2017. Nationwide, overdose deaths have jumped 327% since 2008. With the memories and pain of lost friends and loved ones so close to the surface, the outpouring of grief, anger and demand for action at our conference opening was understandable, and set the tone for the following three days.

The overdose crisis is not solely a Canadian phenomenon. In the United States, the rate of fatal drug overdose has increased by 137% since 2000, with more people now dying from drug overdoses than from road traffic accidents or - shockingly - firearms incidents. Here in the UK the alarm bells are also sounding. Deaths involving heroin and morphine increased by 109% in the England and Wales between 2012 and 2016. Last year, there were 3,744 drug-related deaths in the UK, the highest since records began in 1993.

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