Global Commission on Drugs - Report

Each year, hundreds of thousands of people die globally from preventable drug-related disease and violence. Millions of users are arrested and thrown in jail. Communities all over the world are blighted by drug-related crime. Citizens see huge amounts of their taxes spent on harsh policies which are not working.

But despite this clear evidence of failure, there remains a damaging reluctance across the world to consider a fresh approach. The Global Commission on Drug Policy is determined to help break this century-old taboo. Building on the work of the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, our first report – The War on Drugs – demonstrated how repressive approaches to containing drugs have failed.

We called on governments to adopt more humane and effective ways of controlling and regulating drugs. We recommended that the criminalization of drug use should be replaced by a public health approach. We also appealed for countries to test carefully models of legal regulation as a means to undermine the power of organized crime, which thrives on illicit drug trafficking.

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