This is a crisis caused by drug prohibition—an unintended consequence of nonmedical drug users accessing the black market in drugs. Policymakers should stop harassing doctors and their patients and shift the focus to reforming overall drug policy. A good place to start would be to implement harm reduction measures, such as safe syringe programs, making Medication Assisted Treatments like methadone…

“Needle and syringe programmes are an important harm-reduction intervention,” says Kathryn Leafe, the current executive director of the NZ Needle Exchange Programme. “Harm reduction is based on empathy and a non-judgmental approach, working with people where they are at and however they understand their drug use.” This is the “support don’t punish” model. […]

Harm reduction organisation Know Your Stuff has been testing drugs at festivals across the country and say they have been seeing gradually more people take up their service. […]

Jeff Sessions is leaving decisions about marijuana enforcement to his U.S. attorneys. They could impose huge disruptions on the legal, regulated marijuana business, which is bad enough, but they can’t bring back pot prohibition. Sessions is fighting a lonely, rear-guard battle not even supported by his own party or the president he serves. […]

Mrs McLean’s application to NSW Health to join a medicinal cannabis program has been rejected twice, despite her having support from two leading Australian specialists and approval from the Therapeutic Drugs Administration. […]

Retail cannabis shops in California opened their doors on Monday for the first time, inaugurating what proponents say will become the world’s largest market for legalized recreational marijuana. […]

2017 has seen a worsening opioid deaths crisis in North America, egregious brutality against people who use drugs in the Philippines, and the maintaining – or intensification – of prohibitionist drug policies in a number of countries. However, there have also been a range of progressive steps regarding harm reduction, cannabis reform, and more – all around the world. […]

In recent weeks, there has been an escalation in misleading media coverage of fentanyl – a powerful synthetic opioid used in anaesthesia and to manage severe pain. This coverage could create moral panic of an imminent overdose crisis like those unfolding in Canada and the US. […]

When considering the social stigma surrounding people who use drugs—as a moral failing—the harshest judgments are often directed towards women, particularly those pregnant or with children. […]

Melanie O’Brien, of the University of Queensland, says the punishment Roberts will face could come down to negotiations between the Indonesian and Australian governments. Australian traffickers Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran were executed by firing squad in 2015, 10 years after their arrest as the ringleaders of a heroin smuggling operation. […]