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http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2013/02/21/drug-war-antibiotics.html
Governments worldwide should stop wasting money on criminalizing recreational drugs and use those funds to curb antibiotic misuse, a medical ethicist suggests.
Philosophy Prof. Jonny Anomaly of Duke University in Durham, N.C., called the war on drugs "unwinnable and morally dubious," in his paper published this week in the Journal of Medical Ethics.
"Most of the violence and crime associated with narcotics is caused by laws that prohibit drug use, rather than drug use itself," Anomaly wrote.
Anomaly defines recreational drugs as illegal narcotics such as heroin and marijuana, illegal stimulants such as cocaine, and legal drugs that people take to relieve pain, reduce anxiety, induce euphoria etc.
The claim that stimulants tend to make people violent has little evidence, Anomaly said. In contrast, when Portugal decriminalized recreational drugs, there was not a big increase in consumption.
But antibiotic resistant infections often kill people or impair their health making the infections much more expensive to treat, Anomaly wrote.
The collective harms of antibiotic use pose a serious threat. Although individual patients and doctors perceive benefits from antibiotics,it would be better to reserve them for serious infections, he claims.
cont. http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2013/02/21/drug-war-antibiotics.html
Governments worldwide should stop wasting money on criminalizing recreational drugs and use those funds to curb antibiotic misuse, a medical ethicist suggests.
Philosophy Prof. Jonny Anomaly of Duke University in Durham, N.C., called the war on drugs "unwinnable and morally dubious," in his paper published this week in the Journal of Medical Ethics.
"Most of the violence and crime associated with narcotics is caused by laws that prohibit drug use, rather than drug use itself," Anomaly wrote.
Anomaly defines recreational drugs as illegal narcotics such as heroin and marijuana, illegal stimulants such as cocaine, and legal drugs that people take to relieve pain, reduce anxiety, induce euphoria etc.
The claim that stimulants tend to make people violent has little evidence, Anomaly said. In contrast, when Portugal decriminalized recreational drugs, there was not a big increase in consumption.
But antibiotic resistant infections often kill people or impair their health making the infections much more expensive to treat, Anomaly wrote.
The collective harms of antibiotic use pose a serious threat. Although individual patients and doctors perceive benefits from antibiotics,it would be better to reserve them for serious infections, he claims.
cont. http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2013/02/21/drug-war-antibiotics.html