The Trafficking of Illicit Drugs - Essay Example

The Trafficking of Illicit Drugs In the United States, politicians attempt to make the country a safer place to live by controlling the trafficking of illicit drugs. This “war on drugs” has been an issue since the late 1970’s when South American cartels introduced the influx of cocaine and heroin across the border. The illicit drug market has now become an even more dangerous issue concerning the production of chemical substances that can easily be made in the home or mass produced throughout the world and increased non-medical use of prescription narcotics (Moynihan and Henry, 2006). In order to halt the burgeoning economic, safety, and health issues related to these illicit substances, policy makers must address many issues including creating community based prevention programs for youth and allocating funds for better access to drug rehabilitation programs (National Drug Control Strategy, 2011). Background In Alaska, drug use and distribution is a massive problem and burden that affects the individual, communities, and the entire state. Illicit drug use is higher among Alaska natives than any other ethnic group (Young & Joe, 2009). In addition, Alaska natives have the greatest rates of use for marijuana, cocaine, inhalants, hallucinogens, and non-medical use of psychotherapeutics (Young & Joe, 2009). According to the National Drug Control Strategy (2011) budget summary for the last fiscal year, the hindrance of drug use and its consequences contributes approximately $32 billion dollars in medical costs per year. Social Factors The entire United States is affected by illicit substance abuse. The impact of losing a loved one due to an overdose of illegal drug use is a paramount issue that cannot be qualified by any outside source. The youth of our nation is affected as well as their families. The National Youth Behavior Risk Survey (2011) for the years of 2009 – 2011 indicates that students in high school grades nine through twelve reported either an increase in incidence or no change for marijuana, cocaine, inhalants, heroin, and/or methamphetamine use (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2011). Citizens of the entire nation are also affected by crime that is created by means to obtain illicit substances; an average of 71% of males arrested in 10 metropolitan areas in 2011 tested positive for an illegal substance at the time they were taken into custody (Tombak, 2012). Economic Factors The problem of use of illicit drugs in the United States and the trafficking of illegal drugs cost the nation billions of dollars each year. Densely (2010) notes that the United States losses as much as $110bn on illicit drugs alone for each year. This loss comes about through a lot of avenues. In the first place, millions of dollars is spent on control and prevention programs that aim at ensuring that people in the country do not fall prey to very dangerous act of dealing with or using illicit drugs. The control and prevention programs take several forms including strategic campaigns and law enforcement programs. Because there are specially designated agencies who are supposed to be responsible for the control and prevention of illicit drug use, special allocations are made for them in each year’s budget and this is the source of the huge cost involved (Weiler, 2004). Apart from the cost on control and prevention programs, huge liability is incurred by the nation through the cost of managing affected persons who have suffered the consequences of illicit drug use (Davis-Floyd, 2001). This is because special budgetary allocation is provided for people in rehabilitation homes and other healthcare facilities who receive treatment for various forms of illicit drug use side effects. What is most disturbing is that because such people are often neglected by their families, the government is always forced to bear all the cost and this possesses a serious economic challenge for the nation. Another form of economic factor that the use and trafficking of illicit drugs has on the United States is that the trade in illicit drugs, once succeeded by some few selfish ones creates a false identity of the United States economy, putting the whole economy to a disarray (Engelstad, 2005). What this generally means is that, through the sale of illicit drugs, money gets into the wrong hands and this money is often used in undertaking unacceptable economic practices. Because these monies are often earned through the easiest way, they are spent extravagantly, forcing demand for gods and services to go up. Once this happens, supply is affected and there is the creation of artificial shortages in some instances (Fleming, 1994). Subsequently, this artificial shortage leads to the creation of inflation and increases in prices of goods, which affects the United Sates economy badly. Finally on the economic factors, it would be realized that the continuous trading in illicit drugs gives the United States a very bad international reputation that affects the country negatively as a preferred investment destination. This is because illicit drug trade is internationally forbidden and as such nations that are notorious in dealing in them are often tagged as bad investment destinations. It is the combination of all these factors that create the huge financial loss to the economy of the United States in terms of the use of illicit drugs. Ethical Factors Even though the use of illicit drugs and the trade in them are generally regarded as illegal, basic bioethical principles also provide that the very people who are involved in those acts have basic ethical rights that ought to be protected, just as any other human right is protected (Gaski, 1997). In the medical sector where the professional nurse operates, these ethical factors are more applicable in the instance of dealing directly with people involved in illicit drugs; especially drug addicts (Hopers, 2002). One researcher actually argued that at the level of the practicing nurse, illicit drug users and addicts are treated as patients and not criminals (Isenalumbe, 2000). This is an important statement that sets the pace for handling ethical issues that are involved in illicit drug use. The nurse is obliged by principle to put the needs of the patient first. What this means is that it would be ethically wrong for the nurse to think that because a drug addict was involved in an illegal act, he or she should be left to suffer for his or her own recklessness. Again, the practicing nurse has an ethical obligation to protect the image and personality of all patients, regardless of the background of the patient. This therefore means that there is an ethical responsibility on the nurse to ensure that the basic human rights of the patient are fully protected in an atmosphere where the personality of the patient is not attacked in any way unconstructive (Kleinman, 2010). Political and Legal Factors As far as the issue of illicit drug use is concerned, it could easily be said that the entire United States has a common voice. This is because almost all parties have campaign messages and manifesto promises that promise to continue the fight against illicit drug use and trade (Langer, 2008). Because of this, policies on illicit drugs that have been presented to the Senate and Congress have always had a full house acclamation without the usual feet dragging tactics by the opposition to delay some of these policies and bills. The creation of the National Drug Control Strategy was actually born out of one of these policies that were needed to have a nationwide outfit that was committed to dealing with the use of illicit drugs (Wolinsky, 2005). Furthermore, more powers were vested into the functioning of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Bureau of Justice Statistics to arrest and prosecute users of illicit drug. Through such politically motivated policies and enforcement mechanisms, the FBI have reported in the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports that roughly 1,532,200 drug violation arrests are made each year from 1999 and this represents a rise from 580,900 in 1980 (Almanac of Policy Issues, 2012). In effect, there has been a very strong political will that has been backed with legal interpretations that have resulted in stricter actions being taken on illicit drug users. The result or impact of some of the political and legal factors that have been described above is that the economic and personal effects of illicit drug use on people have reduced considerably over the years (Langer, 2008). This is because the strategy and technique behind most of these political and legal policies have been that of deterrence and prevention, rather than control. In effect, increase in arrests does not necessarily mean increase in use of illicit drug users but increase in effort in getting almost every other person who is involved arrested and prosecuted. Therefore, very latest reports released by Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration have indicated that there are not as many people who suffer from substance abuse today as did a decade ago (Almanac of Policy Issues, 2012). It would therefore be right to argue that on the issue of illicit drug use, the political and legal arenas have perfectly combined their efforts through inter-related policy creation to curtail the menace. The role played by the political arena was also not just played by one dimension or one caucus of the arena but then by both the opposition and ruling government: even though once a while, there have been differences in the approach to use in dealing with the illicit drug trade. Issue Statement The use and trade in illicit drug has become an issue of national concern that requires a multi-variance approach and strategy in preventing and controlling it, and the health sector needs to be made to play a huge proportion of this role as it is in the position of educating and sensitizing the populace on the negative effects of illicit drug use and why they have to resist from the use of it thereof. Stakeholders The best way to identify the stakeholders involved in the illicit drug menace is to ask the “who-how” question. In this case, the ‘who’ question will be asked as, “Who is affected directly and indirectly by illicit drug use?” It is clear that the answer to this question is ‘the drug user and the neighbor of the drug user’. The ‘how’ question could also be posed as, “Who is responsible for preventing and controlling illicit drug use?” It is also clear that the answer to this question is ‘government, law enforcement agencies and the medical fraternity.’ In effect, the major stakeholders in the present issue are drug users, the community, government, law enforcement agencies and the medical fraternity. In the first place, drug users are involved as major stakeholders because they are the direct sufferers of the effect of drug use. They are also the source of all the problems that the use and trade in illicit drugs brings about. As stakeholders, the most important place of drug users in any policy or strategic plan design is the need to building interventions around the drug users (Kleinman, 2010). This also means that interventions that are targeted at drug users must be those that are action based. What this means is that the interventions should be ones that eradicate the occurrence of any new drug user. The community is also captured as an important stakeholder because in most cases, the community is the indirect sufferer of the use and trade in illicit drug. This is because drug users are members of the community and the economic effect of illicit drug use and trade, as elaborated earlier affects each member of the society. Furthermore, federal government has a stake as the pivotal enactor of policies and laws against illicit drug use and trade. Once government is made the head or pivot around which policies and strategic plans should revolve, the advantage that is inherited is that the policies and programs because centralized. Subsequently, their enforcement becomes nationwide rather than limited to only a few areas of the country. Federal government is therefore expected to come up with bills and laws that would mature as policies for long term decision making in the country. On the part of law enforcement agencies, such as the police, federal bureau of investment and the criminal investigation department, their stake in the program comes as enforcers of whatever policies or laws that are implemented by the federal government. This is because policies and laws have been identified as never sufficient in preventing and controlling illicit drug use and drug trade if they will not be made to travel beyond enactment to enforcement (Weiler, 2004). Finally, the medical fraternity comes in as civil experts whose field of practice the issue of illicit drug use and trade greatly affects (Engelstad, 2005). The stake that the medical fraternity, including the practicing nurse would have will be to educate the masses about the effects of illicit drug use and undertake professional duties of catering for drug addicts and other people who suffer various forms of ailments as a result of illicit drug use. Policy Goals and Objectives The best way to address the issue at hand is through the enactment and enforcement of government supported policy that has a goal of minimizing the effect of illicit drug use and trade on the populace. To achieve this broader goal, it is important to have a set of specific objectives that the proposed policy will target. These specific objectives are in two fold and could be described as: 1. Policy on the total eradication of the presence of illicit drugs in the communities of the American society 2. Policy that directly controls that the effect of substance abuse among the young generation and appropriately spells out how victims should be handled. Policy Options and Alternatives Because it is proposed and recommended that the goal of the policy outline above be achieved from a federal government perspective, it is very important that the policies be backed by specific bills with federal government accent (Weiler, 2004). When the policy is pushed to the level of a bill by the federal government, it becomes more authoritative and binding. To this end, two bills that can be currently attributed to the policies outlined above are S.2159, which has the latest Title of “A bill to extend the authorization of the Drug-Free Communities Support Program through fiscal year 2017” (Congressional Budget Office, 2012) and H.R.5711, which comes under the latest title of “Access to Substance Abuse Treatment Act of 2012” (GovTrack, 2012). It would be noted that these two bills are directly linked to the specific objectives set above in such a way that, whiles the S.2159 seeks to tackle eradication of illicit drugs at the community level, the H.R. 5711 also seeks to give specialized attention to substance abuse victims for the promotion of their integrated wellbeing in society. Evaluation of Options Each of the two options selected above comes with its own pros and cons. By critically examining the pros and cons of the various options, it becomes easier to select the most appropriate one for immediate implementation and that for medium to long term implementation. Pro for S.2159 The S.2159 uses a community based approach, which makes it almost impossible to skip any potential illicit drug user (Engelstad, 2005). This is said against the backdrop that community based policy implementation allows for decentralization where by only a smaller population of people are managed or handled at a go. This way, monitoring is very extensive the possibility that some people will fall outside the radar is minimal. Con for S.2159 The same rationale of community based policy makes the policy a very expensive one that requires very huge budgetary allocation to implement. Once availability of funds becomes hampered, the entire success of the program may become jeopardized and successive governments may develop lukewarm attitudes towards its implementation. Pro of H.R.5711 There is an elaborative advantage of the policy or bill in the sense that it would help in the reduction of risk associated with the use of selected illicit drugs such as heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine by promoting public and human safety and reducing crime (GovTrack, 2012). This means that not only will the person involved in the use of drug be protected but the larger society will also be protected under the bill. Con of H.R.5711 Some commentators are of the opinion that the most likely interpretation that some drug users are going to give to this bill is that funds are going to be made available for them even in cases where the worse happens and so they can keep using drugs (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2011). The eradication of this idea and mentality alone demands huge budgetary support to educate the public on the essence of the bill. Results of Analysis & Summary Based on the discussions so far and particularly the evaluation of the options, the researcher strongly recommends that the S.2159, which has the latest Title of “A bill to extend the authorization of the Drug-Free Communities Support Program through fiscal year 2017 greatly meets the goal of the present study and should thus emerge as the most appropriate bill for minimizing the effect of illicit drug use and trade on the populace of the United States. This is because the said bill comes with the option of community based decentralized illicit drug use control. This decentralized aspect of the bill will ensure that specific areas of the country that are identified to be worse or flashpoints in the dealings of illicit drugs are given special concentration and policy attention. Matrix/Scorecard Alternative S.2159 H.R. 5711 Criteria Improves access to preventative health care services with low or no cost to individuals ++ + Improves the availability of services to the uninsured or underinsured ++ + Establishes programs focusing on health promotion and health preventative services. + ++ Score for Each Alternative 5 + 4 + Conclusion In conclusion, it would be said that the United States needs an immediate policy plan for the short term handling of issues and cases of illicit drug use and trade. Nurses also have important roles to play in the policy plan, especially if the S.2159 would be used as the ultimate supporting bill because these practicing nurses would be charged with the responsibility of coming up with result oriented interventions that seeks to identify the most vulnerable ones in the local communities and appropriately applying the interventions to meet the health needs of drug users. With a collaborative effort from all stakeholders who have been identified in the current study, the achievement of the goal of the bill to eradicate illicit drug use to its barest minimum by 2017 will be achieved without fail. REFERENCES Almanac of Policy Issues, (2012). Drug Policy. Retrieved September 15, 2012 from http://www.policyalmanac.org/crime/drugs.shtml Congressional Budget Office (2012). S. 2159, a bill to extend the authorization of the Drug Free Communities Support Program through fiscal year 2017. Retrieved September 16, 2012 from http://www.cbo.gov/publication/43165 Davis-Floyd, R. (2001). "The Technocratic, Humanistic, and Holistic Paradigms of Childbirth." International Journal of Gynecology and Obstetrics Volume 75, Supplement 1, November 2001, pp. 5-23(19). Densely R. (2010). Who's responsible for US illegal drug traffic? Retrieved September 15, 2012 from http://www.ngpharma.com/news/Whos-responsible-for-US-illegal-drug-traffic/ Engelstad, E., Ed. (2005). Challenging Situadedness, gender, culture and the production of Knowledge, Eburon academic publishers. Fleming, J. (1994). "What in the world is being done about TBAs? An overview of international and national attitudes to traditional birth attendants." Midwifery, 10, pp. 142–7. Gaski, H. (1997). Sami Culture in a new era: The Norwegian experience. Seattle, University of Washington Press GovTrack (2012). H.R. 5711: Access to Substance Abuse Treatment Act of 2012. Retrieved September 16, 2012 from http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr5711/text Hopers, C. (2002). Indigenous knowledge and the integration of knowledge systems, towards a philosophy of articulation. Claremont, New Africa Books. Isenalumbe, A. (2000). "Integration of traditional birth attendants into primary health care." World Health Forum vol.11. Kleinman, A. (2010). Patients and Healers in Context of Culture. Los Angeles, University Of California Press. Langer, A. (2008). "Effects of psychosocial support during labour and childbirth." British Journal of Obstetrics and gynecology, 105(10). Moynihan R. and Henry D. (2006) The Fight against Disease Mongering: Generating Knowledge for Action. PLoS Med 3(4): e191. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.0030191 Tombak M. (2012). What is a Disease? Retrieved April 12, 2012 from http://www.starthealthylife.com/page186.htm Weiler Y. (2004). Equal Treatment of People with Disabilities in the EC: What does “Equal” mean? Jean Monnet Working Paper 09/04. Zoe Apostolopoulou. Unpublished Masters Thesis Wolinsky H. (2005). Disease Mongering and Drug Marketing. European Molecular Biology Organization. Retrieved April 12, 2012 from http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1369125/ Read More