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Is the Prohibition of Drugs Useful or Not? Essay

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In the last decade of the twentieth century, people in many countries become aware of drug prohibition. In fact, every country in the world has a form of drugs prohibition. However, national drug prohibition started in 1920s in the United States as a subgroup of national alcohol prohibition. In 1930 the congress of United States separated drugs from the alcohol prohibition law and created a new federal drug prohibition agency (Levine, 2002).
Prohibition may be defined as the set of policies which ban all production, distribution and sale of drugs for non-medical use. A drug refers to any substance that enters the human body and it is able to change the function or structure of the human organs.
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Lower income users will be more susceptible to price change, it has been noted that when drug price rise, rather than reduce use, the result is increased fund-related crime. Therefore, there is a direct link between crime and drugs. A recent survey in New York showed that 75% of crimes, for instance robberies were committed by a group of heroin users. Another American study has highlighted the relationship between the price of prohibited drugs and the level of crime, concluding that a one dollar increase in the price of heroin caused the drug user to commit crimes (power, 1986). Thus, the drug users clearly do not know what is best for them, so society must prevent certain choices from being made.
Moving on, to consider the positive effects of drug prohibition on society. Global drug prohibition is "a social fact" Durkheim (1974), drug prohibition exists whether or not people recognize it, and it has real effects and consequences (ibid). Furthermore, drug prohibition was initiated as a result of strong public opinion. People felt that they should be protected from the harmful effect of drugs. Consequently, certain drugs have been prohibited by international agreement since 1912. Indeed, there is still strong community support for the continued prohibition of these drugs. There is no doubt that many anti-drug campaigns have impressive impacts on people behaviour. Media, however, considered as a major area in people life. For example in the USA,

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