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Article cherry picks the numbers to downplay success of Singapore drug policies. For example it highlights that SG has disproportionate number of people in jai

Article cherry picks the numbers to downplay success of Singapore drug policies. For example it highlights that SG has disproportionate number of people in jail for drug offenses but when you actually normalize it per prison population, USA has higher number of people in jail for drug offenses per 100k population (132 in US vs 120 in SG). Further US data downplay number of people for drug offenses in prisons as many people are in prison as result of drug addiction (robberies, stealing, etc) but not because they were busted with drugs. And here are actual data on substance abuse in US prisons. SG has frankly right even if harsh policy. >While the exact rates of inmates with substance use disorders (SUDs) is difficult to measure, some research shows that an estimated 65% percent of the United States prison population has an active SUD. Another 20% percent did not meet the official criteria for an SUD, but were under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time of their crime. https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/criminal-justice https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/criminal-ju... Frankly my personal opinion - either drugs have to be fully legalized (even hard one) and sold at groceries or fully and effectively banned like in Singapore. Anything in the middle creates more misery.

dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago
> fully and effectively banned like in Singapore Really? Alcohol and tobacco are available everywhere.
- TakuYam 5y ago
  Nobody in history has mugged someone to raise funds for a six pack and a pack of smokes
mistrial9 5y ago
smokes cigarette with a beer to think about this....
soperj 5y ago
You're comparing it to the USA, which has by far the highest rate of incarceration in the world. 5 times more than the average country.
- adventured 5y ago
  Syria, Yemen, Sudan have lower incarceration rates than Germany, Finland, Denmark, Sweden. Wow, must be nice, safe places to live. Pakistan has a lower incarceration rate than Japan. So does The Central African Republic. India's incarceration rate is equal to Iceland, among the lowest in the world. Some of the most dangerous places on the planet have comically hyper low incarceration rates. Without a lot more context incarceration rates don't tell you very much in fact.
  - selimthegrim 5y ago
    Pakistan has a severe shortage in jail capacity.
  - deltree7 5y ago
    Bingo, As a policy-maker, Law Enforcement, you should be optimizing for f(Incarceration Rate) * f(Violent/Property Crime Rate) Merely focusing on Incarceration rate (which the progressives are so fixated on) is naive.
  - boeingUH60 5y ago
    This is something I always ponder. My country (Nigeria) has a relatively low incarceration rate -- 33 in 100,000 [1] -- compared to let's say America -- 639 per 100,000! [2] --but I wouldn't say we're more safe,in fact we're facing a high wave of insecurity and banditry. Part of the reason is that we can't even afford a suitable correctional and judiciary system. Here, most cases such as theft, assault get settled at the police station (precinct) by dialogue between the affected parties, and bail, cough bribe paid. Maybe our relative poverty favors us this way, because honestly I'll never wish my worst enemy to spend time in a Nigerian prison, it's horrible. As a side note, the Central African Republic is the country with the lowest incarceration rate [3] and it's a major warzone. 1- https://www.prisonstudies.org/country/nigeria https://www.prisonstudies.org/country/nigeria 2 - https://www.statista.com/statistics/262962/countries-with-the-most-prisoners-per-100-000-inhabitants/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/262962/countries-with-th... 3 - https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/lowest-prison-rate-(country) https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/lowest-pr...
goodpoint 5y ago
> either drugs have to be fully legalized (even hard one) and sold at groceries or fully and effectively banned like in Singapore. Anything in the middle creates more misery. You make a good point here. Additionally, drug abuse is a symptom of psychological and social distress. Regardless of your views on drugs, any effective ban effectively hides the symptom. But the underlying problem is still to be addressed.
tw04 5y ago
>Frankly my personal opinion - either drugs have to be fully legalized (even hard one) and sold at groceries or fully and effectively banned like in Singapore. Anything in the middle creates more misery. As someone who thinks most drugs should be legalized: that's absolute insanity. The only way you are going to safely allow a drug like heroin on the streets is to have it be prescription based and ideally paired with free mental health services. The illegal drug trade will still obviously exist, but with the uptick in fentanyl lacing, I have a feeling folks will seek out "legitimate" sources if available.
- pessimizer 5y ago
  > The only way you are going to safely allow a drug like heroin on the streets is to have it be prescription based and ideally paired with free mental health services. If that's your standard, it's already a failure. You are never going to "safely" allow heroin on the street. You're never going to "safely" allow children's playgrounds. All prescription heroin is going to be is something that anyone who wants to ever have a better life (free from the record of having taken heroin) will avoid. Imagine if alcohol were only available by prescription, ideally paired with mental health services. In fact, you don't have to, because prescription alcohol was available during prohibition. edit: Hell, prescription opiates are available everywhere, and it turns out to be a bit of a problem.
  - tw04 5y ago
    >If that's your standard, it's already a failure. You are never going to "safely" allow heroin on the street. You're never going to "safely" allow children's playgrounds. The rest of the world disagrees with your assessment. https://drugpolicy.ca/our-work/issues/heroin-assisted-treatment/ https://drugpolicy.ca/our-work/issues/heroin-assisted-treatm...
  - retrac 5y ago
    Heroin by prescription is already available in Switzerland, Germany, the UK, and Canada, probably a number of other countries. In some places, it is considered the standard of treatment for intractable heroin addiction that has failed other treatments repeatedly. This is not new; the idea has been floated around for about a century and used on-and-off, particularly in the UK. Methadone therapy is basically the same idea but substituting a different opioid due to the stigma associated with diamorphine. Hydromorphone is becoming popular lately for this too. When taken under medical supervision (most programs require the addict to come to a clinic daily for dispensing) the physical and social harms are considerably less than using street heroin. The lack of legal, personal and other chaos from always chasing after the next dose often lets people stabilize their lives and wean themselves off. In one of the more thorough studies on this, in Germany about 15 years ago, almost 40% of participants had voluntarily weaned themselves off with slowly decreasing doses after two years. Nearly all had decreased their use of street drugs. Nearly all were housed, some 60% were employed. Most persons admitted to the program had been homeless and and all were unemployed at the start. The average duration of heroin use was more than 20 years. That is a remarkable result. It led to Germany making maintenance therapy generally available for addicts. And it keeps being repeated. There's a large body of evidence supporting the slow self-guided taper for benzodiazepine addiction as well, and a small but growing body that suggests it may work for a great many kinds of various addictive drugs, including stimulants. If we minimize the social and economic chaos to the addict by simply giving them their drug, that give them the opportunity to choose to stop using it. It's an uncomfortable proposition, counterintuitive to some, but the study results are compelling and must be wrangled with.

dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago

> fully and effectively banned like in Singapore Really? Alcohol and tobacco are available everywhere.

TakuYam 5y ago
Nobody in history has mugged someone to raise funds for a six pack and a pack of smokes

mistrial9 5y ago

smokes cigarette with a beer to think about this....

soperj 5y ago

You're comparing it to the USA, which has by far the highest rate of incarceration in the world. 5 times more than the average country.

adventured 5y ago
Syria, Yemen, Sudan have lower incarceration rates than Germany, Finland, Denmark, Sweden. Wow, must be nice, safe places to live. Pakistan has a lower incarceration rate than Japan. So does The Central African Republic. India's incarceration rate is equal to Iceland, among the lowest in the world. Some of the most dangerous places on the planet have comically hyper low incarceration rates. Without a lot more context incarceration rates don't tell you very much in fact.
- selimthegrim 5y ago
  Pakistan has a severe shortage in jail capacity.
- deltree7 5y ago
  Bingo, As a policy-maker, Law Enforcement, you should be optimizing for f(Incarceration Rate) * f(Violent/Property Crime Rate) Merely focusing on Incarceration rate (which the progressives are so fixated on) is naive.
- boeingUH60 5y ago
  This is something I always ponder. My country (Nigeria) has a relatively low incarceration rate -- 33 in 100,000 [1] -- compared to let's say America -- 639 per 100,000! [2] --but I wouldn't say we're more safe,in fact we're facing a high wave of insecurity and banditry. Part of the reason is that we can't even afford a suitable correctional and judiciary system. Here, most cases such as theft, assault get settled at the police station (precinct) by dialogue between the affected parties, and bail, cough bribe paid. Maybe our relative poverty favors us this way, because honestly I'll never wish my worst enemy to spend time in a Nigerian prison, it's horrible. As a side note, the Central African Republic is the country with the lowest incarceration rate [3] and it's a major warzone. 1- https://www.prisonstudies.org/country/nigeria https://www.prisonstudies.org/country/nigeria 2 - https://www.statista.com/statistics/262962/countries-with-the-most-prisoners-per-100-000-inhabitants/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/262962/countries-with-th... 3 - https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/lowest-prison-rate-(country) https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/lowest-pr...

goodpoint 5y ago

> either drugs have to be fully legalized (even hard one) and sold at groceries or fully and effectively banned like in Singapore. Anything in the middle creates more misery. You make a good point here. Additionally, drug abuse is a symptom of psychological and social distress. Regardless of your views on drugs, any effective ban effectively hides the symptom. But the underlying problem is still to be addressed.

tw04 5y ago

>Frankly my personal opinion - either drugs have to be fully legalized (even hard one) and sold at groceries or fully and effectively banned like in Singapore. Anything in the middle creates more misery. As someone who thinks most drugs should be legalized: that's absolute insanity. The only way you are going to safely allow a drug like heroin on the streets is to have it be prescription based and ideally paired with free mental health services. The illegal drug trade will still obviously exist, but with the uptick in fentanyl lacing, I have a feeling folks will seek out "legitimate" sources if available.

pessimizer 5y ago
> The only way you are going to safely allow a drug like heroin on the streets is to have it be prescription based and ideally paired with free mental health services. If that's your standard, it's already a failure. You are never going to "safely" allow heroin on the street. You're never going to "safely" allow children's playgrounds. All prescription heroin is going to be is something that anyone who wants to ever have a better life (free from the record of having taken heroin) will avoid. Imagine if alcohol were only available by prescription, ideally paired with mental health services. In fact, you don't have to, because prescription alcohol was available during prohibition. edit: Hell, prescription opiates are available everywhere, and it turns out to be a bit of a problem.
- tw04 5y ago
  >If that's your standard, it's already a failure. You are never going to "safely" allow heroin on the street. You're never going to "safely" allow children's playgrounds. The rest of the world disagrees with your assessment. https://drugpolicy.ca/our-work/issues/heroin-assisted-treatment/ https://drugpolicy.ca/our-work/issues/heroin-assisted-treatm...
- retrac 5y ago
  Heroin by prescription is already available in Switzerland, Germany, the UK, and Canada, probably a number of other countries. In some places, it is considered the standard of treatment for intractable heroin addiction that has failed other treatments repeatedly. This is not new; the idea has been floated around for about a century and used on-and-off, particularly in the UK. Methadone therapy is basically the same idea but substituting a different opioid due to the stigma associated with diamorphine. Hydromorphone is becoming popular lately for this too. When taken under medical supervision (most programs require the addict to come to a clinic daily for dispensing) the physical and social harms are considerably less than using street heroin. The lack of legal, personal and other chaos from always chasing after the next dose often lets people stabilize their lives and wean themselves off. In one of the more thorough studies on this, in Germany about 15 years ago, almost 40% of participants had voluntarily weaned themselves off with slowly decreasing doses after two years. Nearly all had decreased their use of street drugs. Nearly all were housed, some 60% were employed. Most persons admitted to the program had been homeless and and all were unemployed at the start. The average duration of heroin use was more than 20 years. That is a remarkable result. It led to Germany making maintenance therapy generally available for addicts. And it keeps being repeated. There's a large body of evidence supporting the slow self-guided taper for benzodiazepine addiction as well, and a small but growing body that suggests it may work for a great many kinds of various addictive drugs, including stimulants. If we minimize the social and economic chaos to the addict by simply giving them their drug, that give them the opportunity to choose to stop using it. It's an uncomfortable proposition, counterintuitive to some, but the study results are compelling and must be wrangled with.