TY - JOUR AU - Husak, Douglas PY - 2018/05/19 Y2 - 2024/03/29 TI - Thoughts on Drug Policy, Public Health, and Crime: More Support for Decriminalization JF - Bergen Journal of Criminal Law & Criminal Justice JA - BJCLCJ VL - 6 IS - 1 SE - Articles DO - 10.15845/bjclcj.v6i1.1551 UR - https://boap.uib.no/index.php/BJCLCJ/article/view/1551 SP - 1-19 AB - <p>In this paper I describe the nature of my interest in drug policy; discuss questions about whether and why drugs pose a public health problem; present some empirical results that bear on whether drug proscriptions might be justified because of their causal role in contributing to crime; hazard a few observations about how a society should deal with drug problems; and comment on the recent opiate epidemic plaguing much of the United States. My overall conclusion is that a good rationale for drug prohibitions has yet to be found, and the liberal alternative to criminalization, which recommends that drug use be treated as a public health problem, is problematic as well---even though it certainly would be an improvement on the status quo. </p> ER -