PRESS RELEASE - 6th OCTOBER, 2003

Edition 13.

Cannabis News Items From Around the World

DOCTORS TO PRESCRIBE MARIJUANA IN NSW.

Source: The Australian, (Australia)
Date: Sun, 28 Sep 2003
Copyright: 2003 News Limited
Contact: mailto:ausletr@matp.newsltd.com.au
Website: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/35
Author: Simon Kearney
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

DOCTORS TO PRESCRIBE MARIJUANA

PEOPLE will be able to register to use marijuana for medical conditions in NSW from next year.

The scheme -- which caused an outcry when proposed by the Carr Government before last March's state election -- won in-principle Federal Government approval last week.

Legislation allowing gravely ill people to use marijuana -- most likely in the form of a pill or nasal spray -- is due to be released within weeks.

The scheme will be expanded to include both a clinical trial and to offer several categories of gravely ill people immediate use of cannabis.

"The NSW proposal would involve two parallel initiatives, namely clinical research trials and a compassionate access scheme," Federal Parliamentary Secretary for Health Trish Worth said.

A spokesman for Special Minister of State John Della Bosca confirmed the compassionate scheme was being considered to run alongside the clinical trials announced earlier this year.

"It would be limited to a range of very sick people, people with AIDS, Cancer and Multiple Sclerosis," he said.

The NSW Government plans to create an Office of Medical Cannabis in the NSW Department of Health.

To register for the scheme, patients would have to supply a doctor's certificate outlining that conventional treatments for their condition have been unsatisfactory.

A State Government source said one of the key developments being monitored was British research into a marijuana pill, in which scientists have isolated marijuana's active component, THC. A spray to deliver a dose of THC has also been suggested by Premier Bob Carr.

Ms Worth confirmed that the Federal Government supported the scheme as long as it complied with medical guidelines and international narcotics agreements.

"Any clinical research trial would need to meet the Therapeutic Goods Administration's (TGA) requirements for conducting clinical trials in Australia," she said.

The State Government is looking at options to try to avoid growing a marijuana crop themselves.

In Canada a similar trial ran into problems because the Government-grown marijuana tastes so bad nobody wants to smoke it.

Territory Girl, 5, Shows How To Make Bong In Class

(28 Sep 2003) Australian, The, Australia

A five-year-old Territory girl shocked teachers when she showed her class how to make a bong out of a Coke bottle during a "show and tell" session.

The incident took place at a primary school in Darwin's northern suburbs.

The revelation comes amid mounting concerns over drug use among Territory primary school students.

At least two instances have been reported to the Education Department of children aged between five and 12 being caught with drugs at school.

In one case the drug was amphetamine. Teachers have indicated this may be the tip of the iceberg.

"The little girl showing how to make a bong was the most in-your-face example of drug culture among primary school students I've heard of," one teacher said.

"It's not unheard of that primary school children will be found with drugs at school," the teacher said.

"Usually it's just a bit of dope - they've probably nicked it from their mum's purse and brought it along to show off.

"I've never heard of dealing at a primary school here."

But dealing at Territory schools is not unheard of, police say.

The NT Drug Enforcement Unit has run operations at high schools targeting dealing on school grounds.

Police would not name the schools involved.

The Northern Territory News has learned a member of the NT Police has been seconded to the Education Department to work on their new drug policy and protocols.

"The drug education policy is under revision to ensure it accurately reflects modern trends," the spokesperson said.

Students with drugs at school are reported to the school-based constable and are subject to suspension.

A Department of Education spokesman said students being found with drugs at Territory schools was rare.

The spokesman said prosecutions against students are not always pursued.

"Depending on the incident, the constable may refer the matter to the police for further action," the spokesman said.

"Usually, the student involved would be suspended for a period determined by the school, taking into consideration the seriousness of the incident.

"The student would also receive counselling and would be required to successfully undertake a re-entry interview before returning to the school once the period of suspension has passed."

Pt Lincoln Mayor Calls for Lethal Injection for Drug Users

Location: Port Lincoln, South Australia
Pubdate: Tue, 30 Sep 2003
Source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation (Australia Web)
Copyright: 2003 Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Contact: mailto:comments@your.abc.net.au
Website: http://www.abc.net.au/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/34
Bookmark:http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?137 (Needle Exchange)

MAYOR CALLS FOR LETHAL INJECTION FOR DRUG USERS

Controversial Port Lincoln Mayor Peter Davis has called for drug addicts to be given a lethal injection to cut rising illicit drug use on South Australia's Eyre Peninsula.

Police statistics show the rate of amphetamine and marijuana use among teenagers in the region is increasing alarmingly.

Cr Davis says the use of intravenous drugs has also risen since the introduction of a local needle exchange program.

He says there should be less tolerance to both drug users and traffickers.

"I don't have a problem with the free needle exchange but the drug addict who wants to exchange a needle should be given a lethal injection," he said.

"You want the trip of your life, in fact the last trip of your life? Not a problem, come on in and we'll deal with you."

NILS CHRISTIE QUESTIONS PROHIBITIONIST APPROACH

NORWEGIAN PROFESSOR NILS CHRISTIE
WARNS OF UPCOMING ALCOHOL PROBLEMS,
QUESTIONS PROHIBITIONIST APPROACH TO DRUGS.

Christie Calls For Rational Debate - Opposes Taboos.

At a seminar at the auditorium of the Finnish Parliament on Thursday, the world-renowned Norwegian criminologist Professor Nils Christie told his audience of more than 100 people that the war against illegal drugs cannot be won, and that it is therefore better to concentrate on reducing the harm caused by the drugs. Christie's message did not come as a surprise to the
listeners.

About two decades ago he and Finnish sociologist Kettil Bruun wrote about these same ideas in a book entitled Den gode fiende: narkotikapolitikk i Norden ("The Good Enemy: Drug Policy in the Nordic Countries"). On Thursday Christie warned that Finnish policy toward intoxicants was facing serious trouble - not because of illegal drugs, but rather because of alcohol.

Christie was alarmed about the prospect of a lower tax on alcohol in a situation in which problems caused by drinking are constantly on the increase. He pointed out that about 3,500 people in Finland die each year as a result of using alcohol. Christie emphasised that he is opposed to
using all drugs, including cannabis, recommending as an alternative stimulation from activities such as hiking in the mountains. However, he also said that society must accept the fact that not all people are able to stop using drugs, and that such people need to be helped. "We cannot win
the war against drugs.

Drugs always exist and they should be seen more as a problem of social policy rather than one of criminal justice. We must assess the damage caused by various options, and choose the one that involves the least amount of damage", Christie emphasised. Christie is also concerned about
the increasing prison population in Western countries, which he largely sees as the result of the war on drugs. The problem mainly affects the United States, where there are 730 prisoners for every 100,000 inhabitants. The figure is about ten times as high as in the Nordic Countries. He pointed out that crime rates can be influenced through choices of penal policy.

One example of this is the Finland of the 1960s, which had an incarceration rate that was equivalent to that of East European countries, but which later brought its policy more in line with practice in the other Nordic Countries.

Christie was also critical of the fact that in the war on drugs Sweden - and to some extent Norway - have allied themselves with the United States. In this respect, Sweden, which has the reputation of being a "welfare paradise", gives legitimacy to the war on drugs, while the United States
provides the power. Christie feels that it is not realistic to base drug policy on total prohibition. Instead, he favours harm reduction. One example of harm reduction mentioned by Christie is to provide hygienic conditions for the use of drugs - clean needles for intravenous users, for instance - as well as easy access to drug maintenance therapy.

He pointed out that heroin addicts require their doses even if they are in prison. Christie also said that dangerous substances should be taken under official control - as prescription medicines, for instance. "After all, explosives are not sold at kiosks."

Christie warned against demonising drugs or turning them into such a taboo that it would prevent rational debate on the problem.

He recalled the uproar that the book Den gode fiende... caused in Norway 20 years ago. He said that at the time it was quite impossible to advance opinions opposed to the official policy of total prohibition, as drug crime was seen as the moral equivalent of murder. Now Christie says that the
situation has calmed down, although he still gets some bitter comments. "Most recently a listener said that he is happy that I am so old that I will not be able to express my opinions very long." At the seminar Tapani Sarvanti, an official at the Ministry for Social Affairs and Health, pointed out that Finnish drug policy differs from that of Sweden in an interesting way. Sarvanti said that in recent years Finland has implemented an "elegant" shift in the direction of harm reduction, away from the prohibitionist approach.

BURSTING POINT: THE DRUGS MULES FILLING UP UK PRISONS

Pubdate: Tue, 30 Sep 2003
Source: Guardian, The (UK)
Copyright: 2003 Guardian Newspapers Limited
Contact: mailto:letters@guardian.co.uk
Website: http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardian/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/175
Author: Audrey Gillan

Bursting Point - The Drugs Mules Filling Up UK Prisons

The huge number of Jamaican women coming into Britain with their stomachs full of cocaine is pushing the already overcrowded female prison system to breaking point. More than 10% of the women currently in jail are Jamaican drug mules who swallowed rubber wraps of cocaine and boarded flights to this country.

A Guardian investigation has established that the long sentences being served by the 450 Jamaican couriers are stretching resources to the limit while failing to act as a deterrent to the desperate women prepared to smuggle drugs.

The crisis has deepened since July, when a glut of women prisoners were sentenced before the courts went into summer recess. Women are regularly being bused around as prisons try to find them cells and overcrowding is blamed for the unprecedented number of suicides within female jails: 17 women have taken their own lives since August last year.

Jamaican drug couriers have been identified as a key factor in the overcrowding problem. At a time when cells are in short supply, the prison service has been forced to dedicate four of the 17 women's jails to housing foreign women.

One, Morton Hall prison in Lincolnshire, is the first jail in the country to have more Jamaicans than any other nationals behind bars - a total of 155, compared with 115 women of all other nationalities.

The Guardian has obtained access to prisoners and prison governors, as well as speaking to lawyers, reform campaigners and the women's families in Britain and Jamaica, to produce the most detailed examination yet of a trade that has deluged this country's prisons while devastating families
and communities in the Caribbean.

The pressure is now so great that British private companies have been invited to tender to build a jail in Jamaica so that the mules currently imprisoned in this country could be transferred back to the Caribbean.

According to senior officials, the project is being pursued by the Jamaican authorities but there is speculation that the British government would consider underwriting it.Peter Mathers, British high commissioner in Jamaica, said: "A number of British companies are interested and there are companies that are bidding and we hope that it will happen soon."

Another option ministers are being urged to contemplate is to stop prosecuting the mules and to simply confiscate their drugs and deport them, or to develop community sentences in Jamaica. Others, including the new director of public prosecutions, believe their sentences should be
shorter.

At Morton Hall, two to three Jamaicans a week are being transferred there from local prisons, even though customs and Foreign Office measures have managed to cut the overall number of mules making it to the UK.

The official prison service line is that its duty is to accommodate whoever the courts decide to jail, regardless of population pressures. But Lynn Saunders, Morton Hall's governor, said the principal cause of the problem was the length of sentence being handed down to couriers who, customs
officials admit, play a minuscule role in drug trafficking into this country.

She said: "There are issues about the sentencing these women get. They are very long and disproportionate to sentences for violence against the person. We have got people doing 10 years here.

"We haven't seen a drop in the number of Jamaican women being admitted but I am told there has been a leavening off. We haven't seen that."

Barbara Thompson, 39, a mother of six, is typical of the mules doing time in Morton Hall. She is serving three years and nine months for carrying 341g of cocaine in her stomach. Hers is a story of deprivation, desperation and, she now admits, naivety. A street seller in the Jamaican capital
Kingston, she was approached by a young woman who told her she could make "much more money another way".

Thompson was given an address in Spanish Town, outside Kingston, where she was shown piles of little parcels containing 100% pure cocaine. Made from the fingers of latex gloves and secured with tape, each was the size of the top of her thumb. She was supposed to swallow 100 and was given six bottles of juice to wash them down. She managed to swallow 52.

Thompson was paid ?400 in Jamaican dollars in advance and told that she would get another ?1,600 when she got to England.

Although she had been warned not to have any food or drink, she started eating as soon as she got on the plane in the hope that she would pass the drugs in the toilet and leave them there. While on the plane she was told of a woman who had died with drugs in her stomach because one of the
packages she had swallowed had burst. It can cause a slow and painful death, with the victim fully aware that their respiratory system is going into overdrive.

But by the time she landed at Heathrow, the drugs were still in Thompson's body and when she was stopped by customs officers, she told them immediately what she had done. "I wanted to tell them that I had some drugs inside me and that I didn't know how to get them out but I was afraid they would take me in for a strip search. But then I told them I was loaded."

She was taken to a special, see-through toilet at the airport where customs officers watched and retrieved the drugs from a bowl as they passed through her system. An x-ray at a local hospital revealed that one wrap was still in her stomach so she was taken back to Heathrow to wait for it to pass through.

"I was so scared that that one would never come out and that I would die," she said.

After 12 weeks in Holloway prison, Thompson was taken to court. Her circumstances in Jamaica were not taken into consideration when she was sentenced. However, she said she was so relieved that she had not died on the plane that part of her was glad she had ended up in prison.

But she did not realise the high price she and her family would have to pay for her getting caught. Since she failed to meet the person she was supposed to deliver the drugs to in a cafe at Heathrow's terminal three, the gang who supplied them in Kingston assumed that she had stolen them. As punishment, they kidnapped her brother, stabbed him and then burnt him alive.

That has not satisfied their desire for revenge. "They have been making threats to my family and they don't believe that I am in prison. I don't want to go back on the streets in Kingston and sell because I am very scared that they will find me. I am going to have to go and live somewhere
else."

She added: "I will never do the drugs thing again. I don't feel pleased with what I have done and I am not proud."

Earlier this month, a letter written by a group of Jamaican inmates was smuggled out of prison and sent to the home secretary, David Blunkett, on behalf of women like Barbara. The letter points out that each woman costs the taxpayer ?24,000-?35,000 a year to keep locked up and pleads for
remission and reform of the sentencing system.

Since 1997 when Labour came to power, the number of foreign women in British prisons has increased by 140%, to an average of 4,500, compared with 1,577 10 years ago.

Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said: "Foreign national women in British jails don't cause any trouble, but they do contribute to the in tolerable pressure on the system simply by being in prison so long."

Olga Heaven of Hibiscus, the British organisation that helps foreign women in prison here and attempts to ease their resettlement when they are released and deported home, says the number of Jamaican women imprisoned has increased exponentially and that the figure is more like 20% of the female population. When she set up a Jamaican arm of Hibiscus in 1995, there were only 27 women from the island in prison in the UK.

The official figures may also seriously underestimate the trafficking problem. Ms Heaven believes that the women are often used as decoys to allow more serious couriers to make it through.

She said: "I can't see what sense it makes to hold a woman in her mid to late 30s to a long prison sentence when she's just a courier who has never done anything like this in her life before."

Two weeks ago, an inquest pronounced an open verdict on a Jamaican prisoner, Beverley Fowler, 32, who was found hanging in her cell in Durham prison last October two days before she had been due to be deported. The inquest heard that little was done to help Fowler to prepare for her deportation to Jamaica where she had been gang raped and had faced threats and violence.

She had three children, aged 16, 14, and 12 and was a single mother after the children's father was shot dead in 1998; her mother, who had been looking after the children while she was in prison, died in April 2002. Fowler's request for compassionate release was turned down, in spite of having just six months to serve of her six year sentence.

The majority of the Jamaican women in prison here are over 30 and many are single mothers. Catherine Phillips, 49, is a grandmother who swallowed 601g of cocaine, with an estimated street value of ?57,000. She is now serving a six-year sentence. "I was supposed to be here for nine days, I have been here now for three years," she said.

Like Thompson, Phillips washed the drugs down with juice, becoming what customs officers term a "stuffer and swallower". But unlike Thompson, Phillips came close to dying because the drug wraps would not leave her system. Three days after being caught she was taken to hospital, where an x-ray showed that the wrapping of the packages had melded together. Doctors told her that they would soon have to operate or the drugs would enter her system and she would die.

She said: "The customs officer explained that if I had not been caught and got through to the dealer I would have died because they would not have had an x-ray and would not have known they were melting."

Phillips, who pleaded guilty in court and wrote a letter to the judge apologising for her actions, believes that long sentences are not a deterrent because the women who become mules do not know about them until they are caught.

"It's not in any conversation that prison is a possibility. It's just going to England and getting this package delivered. Those drug dealers won't go to jail and they don't know anything about prison life or what's going on. They would just leave you to die. They will find somebody else to fill
your space.

"I can't tell people don't do it when they are starving. But they should know it's six, seven, eight, nine, 10 years... you ain't coming back and you can't bargain with the judge."

(All the names of the women prisoners and their families have been changed)

USUAL POLITICAL PRESS RELEASE :
TOUGH ON DRUGS - TREATMENT GRANTS FUNDING

www.pm.gov.au
PRIME MINISTER
2 October 2003
TOUGH ON DRUGS – TREATMENT GRANTS FUNDING

I am pleased to announce over $41 million in grants under Tough on Drugs for community organisations to provide treatment, rehabilitation and support for those affected by illicit drugs.

Ninety eight treatment services will receive funding as part of this announcement for a range of treatment and support services to combat illicit drug use in Australia.

The Australian Government strongly supports the services provided by community based organisations because they have extensive practical experience helping people at the coal-face, and the evidence shows that their programmes are effective.

This national support includes grants of over $6.9 million for Queensland services, including:

Providing $517,000 for Drug Arm’s Home Assessment and Response Team (HART), an outreach initiative that strives to improve people’s quality of life through efforts such as therapy, relapse prevention and other support services.

Over $315,000 for the Alcohol and Drug Foundation at Logan House in Logan City, south of Brisbane, to maintain and develop aftercare and assessment services in residential rehabilitation.

More than $400,000 to St.Vincent’s Hospital in Cairns for an integrated drug treatment facility targeting homeless people and providing a general health clinic, community residential detoxification and aftercare services.

A further $215,000 for the Salvation Army Fairhaven facility in Townsville, which is a recovery service for women that provides interventions to improve the health and social situations of women with addictions.

This is in addition to over $6.1 million in grants under this programme for fifteen services that I announced on 28 August 2003 to help indigenous communities deal with problems of drug and substance abuse. Over $1.1 million of these grants will assist indigenous communities in Queensland.

Community organisations in every state and territory receive grants under today’s announcement, confirming continuing government support for services first funded by the Australian Government in 1999. This funding will enable them to build on the valuable treatment and support services they are already providing to local communities.

Most importantly, the treatment and support projects announced today will continue to help individuals and families to recover from drug use and resume a normal healthy life.

This brings total funding allocated under this programme since it started in 1997 to $106 million. On 9 August 2003 the government called for applications for the remaining funds committed in the 2002-03 Budget for treatment grants to community organisations.

An announcement regarding those applications is expected shortly.

This is one of many Australian government initiatives to combat drug use and the harm it causes. Late last year I announced that a further $215 million would be provided over four years to the Council of Australian Governments Illicit Drug Diversion Initiative for a range of projects aimed at diverting minor drug offenders away from the criminal justice system and into treatment and education services.

Since 1997 the Australian Government has committed over $1 billion through the Tough on Drugs Strategy to a range of programmes aimed at reducing the demand and supply of illicit drugs in Australia. Our success has been documented by the United Nations in its latest Global Illicit Drugs Trends Report, which describes the “heroin drought” produced across the South East Asia and Pacific region, largely by Australia’s enforcement efforts.

Clearly, illicit drug use is a problem that is not confined to our borders. Countries throughout the Asia Pacific region are actively supporting the international effort to reduce supply and demand for illicit drugs. In light of our recent success, it is important that Australia explore ways new ways to work with our regional neighbours to combat drugs across the region.

Illicit drug use is an international problem and it is in Australia’s national interest to reduce drug use and traffic in our region. Collaborative efforts are already under way with other countries in our region to control drug supply.

I am also announcing today that the Australian National Council on Drugs has been asked to increase its links throughout the Asia-Pacific region, specifically to promote drug use prevention, reduction and treatment. The Government will provide $400,000 from existing Tough on Drugs and related funds for this initiative. In undertaking this wider role, the ANCD will advise the Australian Government on the most appropriate ways to work with our regional neighbours to share the knowledge and understanding we have developed from our successful strategies to reduce demand for illicit drugs, particularly our work with the community sector, as well as to learn from their experiences.

I thank the Australian National Council on Drugs for their guidance and advice on the government’s Tough on Drugs strategy and other substance abuse issues and for bringing community skills and local understanding to the fight against illicit drugs and substance abuse.

USUAL FOLLOW UP POLITICAL PRESS RELEASE :
GRANTS TO TACKLE DRUG PROBLEM WELCOMED

Media release : The Hon Trish Worth MP Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health and Ageing Member for Adelaide

40/2003 Thursday 2 October 2003

GRANTS TO TACKLE DRUG PROBLEM WELCOMED

Parliamentary Secretary for Health, Trish Worth, has welcomed today’s announcement by the
Prime Minister that more than $41 million will be provided in grants to help tackle Australia’s illicit
drug problem.

The funding, made under the Non-Government Organisation Treatment Grants Programme
(NGOTGP), is part of the Australian Government’s National Illicit Drug Strategy, Tough on Drugs,
and will assist 98 organisations across the nation to continue to provide a wide variety of treatment
projects.

“The funding will expand services for treating illicit drug problems, with particular emphasis on
filling geographic and target group gaps in the coverage provided by existing treatment services,
including youth, women with children, Indigenous Australians and those in rural and regional
areas,’’ Ms Worth said.

“By their very nature, the funded projects are specific to their local areas and thus are designed to
take into account local conditions and needs.

“The grants recognise the expertise and, especially, the commitment of these community groups
that do so much to help deal with the illicit drug problem and its effects on not only users but also
their family members and friends.

“I commend those who work within those treatment services included today in the Prime Minister’s announcement. They are doing a great job and they deserve the support of all Australians.” This funding is in addition to the $6.1 million announced by the Prime Minister in August to 15 services across Australia to help indigenous communities deal with problems of drug and substance abuse.

Tough on Drugs was launched by the Prime Minister in 1997. Since then, the Australian
Government has allocated more than $1 billion to the programme for a range of supply reduction,
demand reduction and harm reduction measures.

Media contact: Mark Williams, Ms Worth’s Office - 0401 147 558

THAT'S ALL FOR NOW FOLKS!