UN
Drug
Report
Warns
Against
Injecting
Rooms
2/25/00
The United Nations' International Narcotics Control Board's (INCB) annual report, released this week, contains many of the admonitions against drug reform that have become a familiar refrain from the agency in recent years as numerous countries experiment with public health based approaches to drug control. Past targets have included the United States, which received an unfavorable mention after voters in California and Arizona passed laws removing penalties on the medicinal use of marijuana, and Switzerland, which was scolded at length when it chose to continue prescribing heroin to addicts under clinical supervision. But this year the honor fell to Australia, which has infuriated INCB officials in its perseverance in planning medically supervised injecting rooms for drug users. Any government that allows injecting rooms, "could be considered to be in contravention of the international drug control treaties," reads a special section devoted to the issue. "The international drug control treaties were established many decades ago precisely to eliminate places, such as opium dens, where drugs could be abused with impunity." While the warning does not mention Australia specifically, its message was perceived as less than veiled in that country, where state governments and public health officials have worked for years to put a trial safe injection program in place. One of their harshest opponents has been tough-on-drugs Prime Minister John Howard, so perhaps it is not surprising that Australian newspapers reported this week that drug policy adviser David Pennington accused Howard of influencing the INCB report. Howard denied the charge, calling it "offensive to the Board and to the government," but continues to oppose the trials. In any case, this would not be the first time the INCB has interposed itself in Australian drug policy affairs. In 1998, a plan to conduct a heroin prescription experiment similar to Switzerland's was scrapped after the INCB, reportedly under pressure from the US State Department, threatened to close down Tasmania's pharmaceutical opiate industry. And just two months ago, the agency sent a letter to Australia's UN ambassador which contained warnings similar to those in the annual report. Nevertheless, officials in Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New South Wales have vowed to proceed with the injecting room trials, which they hope will help bring addicts into treatment while reducing street drug use and the spread of disease. The project in New South Wales, which will be sponsored by the Uniting Church, is already seeking a program site. Australia may be the most recent industrialized country to pursue alternatives to punitive drug prohibition, but it is unlikely to be the last. On Friday (2/25), Germany's upper house of parliament is set to vote on its own proposal to legalize injection rooms, which have been tolerated in major cities there for years. The measure passed the lower house on Thursday. The International Narcotics Control Board's annual report is on the web at http://www.incb.org. DRCNet's past coverage of
the INCB includes stories at
For more information about injecting rooms, visit The Lindesmith Center's focal point web site at http://www.lindesmith.org/library/focal6.html.
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