Australia: Legalise all drugs, says prison doctor | Australia

Australia: Legalise all drugs, says prison doctor

ALL drugs should be legalised to help address addiction and prison overloading, a doctor told the Australia 2020 summit today.
Wendell Rosevear, a GP who has worked in the prison system for more than 30 years, said people would change their behaviour only if they were given choices.
"I want to give drug addicts choices and I want to legalise all drugs in Australia," he said. "Drugs are illegal, so we put people in jail to solve the problem and we label people who use drugs as bad - it doesn't make them feel valuable. We need honesty to deal with the issue." "If we think that we can just put it out of sight, out of mind, we are actually devaluing people and not solving the problem."

Dr Rosevear said the billions of dollars spent on prisons would be better spent on drug intervention and education programs.

He made the call in front of federal Housing Minister Tanya Plibersek in the summit's communities stream.

The 100 delegates in the stream have split into six groups focusing on disadvantage, common values, social inclusion, strong families, leadership structures and building community ownership.

Each of the groups has been asked to come up with one strong idea by the end of the day.

http://www.news.com.au

Trackback(0)

TrackBack URI for this entry