Drug warriors' staunch opposition to needle exchanges to prevent the spread of HIV in addicts delayed the programs' widespread introduction in most states for years. A federal ban on funding for these programs wasn't lifted until 2009. Contrast this with… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
Punishment by definition isn't going to help. So what you need to do is to help people to change and recover is to help them find different areas of passion and help them find better ways of coping. Because about 50 percent of people with addiction have a preexisting mental illness, about two-thirds have had some type of severe trauma… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
There's traditionally been two different ways of seeing addiction. Either it's a sin and you're a horrible bad person and you are just choosing to be hedonist or it's a chronic progressive disease. And while I certainly believe addiction is a medical problem that should be dealt with by the health system, the way we've conceptualized addiction as a disease… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
The thing about our drug laws is that they're not based on science. — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
Marijuana is not not harmful, but is the least harmful psychoactive substance that we have, with the possible exception of caffeine. — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
There is a safe, nontoxic drug called naloxone that can instantly reverse opioid overdose and prevent most of these deaths. But the drug war interferes with saving overdose victims in two ways: first, because witnesses to overdose fear prosecution, they often don't call for help until it's too late. Second, because the drug war supports the belief that making naloxone… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
When President Nixon declared war on drugs on June 17, 1971, about 110 people per 100,000 in the population were incarcerated. Today, we have 2-3 million prisoners: 743 people per 100,000 in the population. The U.S. has 5% of the world's population, but 25% of its prisoners. As Senator Jim Webb once put it, Either we are home to the… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
Because of the war on drugs, pain patients are treated with skepticism and pain doctors live in fear of being prosecuted for overprescribing. The end result is that addicts still get their opioids without much trouble, while genuine patients often can't find treatment. Those who do must typically be tracked in a database and must schedule frequent, expensive doctor visits… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
I think our drug laws need to be made scientifically, as best as possible, recognizing that values will always be part of that. — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
Addiction is when you fall in love with a drug instead of a child or a lover and the learning that takes part in that part of the brain is designed by evolution to get us to persist despite negative consequences to do what we need to do - because I don't know anybody who could survive a relationship or… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share
We should not be putting kids in cages and hoping that is going to fix their psychological problems of any type. — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
I don't have kids, but I've often noticed when people first become parents they seem to completely forget their own adolescence and they start… — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
In order for people to recover, we can't just say 'love is all we need.' — Maia Szalavitz Copy Share Image
