Photo/FILE President Obama has agreed to direct talks on the thorny issue of rampant drug consumption in the United States.
The White House unveiled a new drug policy strategy Tuesday that veers away from imposing heavy prison sentences for illicit drug use and focuses instead on prevention and treatment.
Officials said the new approach looks at drug addiction as a treatable disease rather than a crime.
"Outdated policies like the mass incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders are relics of the past that ignore the need for a balanced public health and safety approach to our drug problem," said Gil Kerlikowske director of the National Drug Control Center in a statement.
"The policy alternatives contained in our new strategy support mainstream reforms based on the proven facts that drug addiction is a disease of the brain that can be prevented and treated and that we cannot simply arrest our way out of the drug problem," he said.
The announcement of a revised administration drug policy approach comes just days after a regional summit in Cartagena, Colombia, where leaders from across the Americas agreed to consider alternatives to the US-led "War on Drugs," which over the decades has claimed tens of thousands of lives, but yielded only meager results.
"Outdated policies like the mass incarceration of nonviolent drug offenders are relics of the past that ignore the need for a balanced public health and safety approach to our drug problem," said Gil Kerlikowske director of the National Drug Control Center in a statement.
"The policy alternatives contained in our new strategy support mainstream reforms based on the proven facts that drug addiction is a disease of the brain that can be prevented and treated and that we cannot simply arrest our way out of the drug problem," he said.
The announcement of a revised administration drug policy approach comes just days after a regional summit in Cartagena, Colombia, where leaders from across the Americas agreed to consider alternatives to the US-led "War on Drugs," which over the decades has claimed tens of thousands of lives, but yielded only meager results.
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