Drug use in Ireland

katherineconlan

Drug use has increased massively in the last 20 years. Coke is now consumed as much if not more than alcohol on a night out and the Gardai are becoming loose with their attitudes on cannabis. When will we see other drugs (ecstasy, meth, opioids) decriminalized or even legalized?

Tomaldo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058219780/drug-use-in-ireland

The sooner the better, the War on Drugs has failed. Why not try legalization for a couple of years, if it doesn't work out, revert to prohibition.

global23214124

I would legalise everything so people can consume non mixed drugs if they are going to be consuming anyways. Would stop overdoes I'd say if there were safe injection centres too. Not everyone that's addicted is going to be able to give up at the drop of a hat so we need safe facilities for people to use. Criminalizing drug use has not worked so its time for a different approach.

katherineconlan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118223806#Comment_118223806

Truth be told, we could solve the heroin problem in Ireland if doctors prescribed pharmaceutical opioids like oxycodone and fentanyl which already exist here. Would probably get rid of the need for injection sites as users would just ingest the pill.

Brid Hegarty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118223626#Comment_118223626

And reverting back would be easy?

All drugs should be legal because having them illegal will never stop people taking them and there's money to be made from taxing them which could in turn fund better education about drug use rather than keeping them illegal and funding gangs.

Housefree

I would have to walk further for alcohol than banned substances, you friendly coke dealer usually delivers

Danzy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118224312#Comment_118224312

They couldn't become more common

Danzy

Tomaldo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118224312#Comment_118224312

Yes , we saw how easy it was to ban the Head Shops. More recently when we eased restrictions during Covid, it wasn't difficult to reintroduce them.

t

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058219780/drug-use-in-ireland

I doubt very much drug use has increased massively in 20 years. There have always been a lot of drugs, it's just the type of drug has changed.

I'm mid 40s, and the early 90s there were drugs everywhere! Ecstasy, speed, acid, weed, all huge back then. Coke use has increased, it's far cheaper now.

There were a lot more heroin addicts back then too.

Brid Hegarty

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118224462#Comment_118224462

Well I'm not so sure it would shut down the illegal market. A very small percentage of the cannabis bought in California is made legally. It's a lot more expensive to make it with a license.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058219780/drug-use-in-ireland

Legalise all drugs. Introduce a drug buying licence where you have to pass a knowledge test showing you are aware of each drugs characteristics and dangers, it gets endorsed for it and you can then buy it from a Pharmacy or specialised outlet.

The amount of money saved on policing, courts and incarceration would be prodigious. The sky hasn't fallen anywhere drugs have been legalised.

KaneToad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225785#Comment_118225785

I don't think the effects of drug taking are at a neutral cost to the state/society. Legalising will certainly reduce cost for some areas but will increase them for others.

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225810#Comment_118225810

No it won't. The medical costs are already there, you would get VAT from the drug sales and liscencing and drug use usually decreases when they are legalised.

KaneToad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225826#Comment_118225826

I wouldn't like to hang a drug policy on "usually".

Also, would the use of illegal drugs not still remain - non VAT levied and non licenced products?

cnocbui

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225879#Comment_118225879

The high price of drugs is usually due to their illegality and they are often of dangerous quality due to poisonous additives. Legalised drugs made to high standards might even be cheaper. I wouldn't know, but is heroin cheaper than diamorphine, which is medical heroin?

Have a look at the cost savings mentioned here: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/oct/09/drug-addicts-to-receive-diamorphine-twice-a-day-in-uk-first-scheme

I know that opium poppies are grown in Tasmania on specialy licensed farms with high security costs, to produce medical grade opioids. The high security costs of all stages of the industry would be reduced dramatically if the end product were available legally.

There is plenty of real world data on which to base a sane drugs policy. You wouldn't need to rely on my 'usually'. This is a casual coversation, not a Phd dissertation.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058219780/drug-use-in-ireland

Drug use has increased massively in the last 20 years.

[Citation needed]

Coke is now consumed as much if not more than alcohol on a night out

Completely false, I'm afraid

and the Gardai are becoming loose with their attitudes on cannabis.

Again, completely false

When will we see other drugs (ecstasy, meth, opioids) decriminalized or even legalized?

Other drugs? Why, what drugs have already been decriminalised or legalised?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118224344#Comment_118224344

Pretty much every single brewery and every single supermarket (bar a few) offer delivery services these days. Truth is, you don't have to walk anywhere, bar the front door.

Housefree

'Pretty much every single brewery and every single supermarket (bar a few) offer delivery services these days. Truth is, you don't have to walk anywhere, bar the front door.'

At 3am on a Saturday?

Tomaldo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225698#Comment_118225698

A lot of clothes, designer makes, football jerseys etc are made and sold illegally. I never hear any calls for the genuine ones to be banned.,

corner of hells

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118223836#Comment_118223836

Like methadone or suboxone ?

erlichbachman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118223836#Comment_118223836

Good lord, you are some way out of touch if you believe your local friendly intravenous heroine user will hand over their needles and suffice with swallowing said heroine, and waiting patiently for a kick.

katherineconlan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118227891#Comment_118227891

I know I'd rather consume diamorphine pills that have gone through quality control than buy the same chemical on the black market and inject it. Sure the rush is decreased but there's much less risk of dying of overdose and you know exactly what's in it.

Besides, the junkies will probably just get the diamorphine tablets from the pharmacy, ground them up, and inject them (assuming they don't contain nasty binding agents).

McGarnigle2020

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058219780/drug-use-in-ireland

People seem to forget that unlike other countries cocaine use in Ireland is largely confined to the working class.

There's this national obsession that coke is the best friend of every other household in Foxrock and Kiliney.

Sit in a toilet cubicle in a pub in Rathgar for an hour on a Friday night, sit in one in Finglas on Saturday. Count how many times you hear someone hoovering away in another cubicle. If cocaine is so rampant in south west Dublin how come the wealthiest drug gangs in the state don't originate in the handful of working class enclaves in that area (Shankill, Ballybrack, parts of DL and Leopardstown). How often do you read a news story about a young man Dun Laoghaoire Rathdown in court and the defense giving the "battling a cocaine addiction" mitigation?

Mate of mine worked in one of the main banks, now it was fairly lower level admin stuff but still. He reckoned of 60 people on the floor, all 45 or younger, he would be surprised if more than 5 or 6 of them had ever taken anything stronger than a vodka. They were simply a very straight laced, middle class set. He was always surprised how many of them were in the process of buying houses given the wages were muck, but they were simply all former students accustomed to living that tight fisted student lifestyle, that's how they accumulated their money. Penneys clothes, Eurosaver McDonalds and 7 pints and a Nightlink constituting a wild night out.

Drug use transcends class in other countries but in this country your average cocaine addict is a construction worker with money to burn.

Caolan and Sorcha who live in Deansgrange didn't get 500 points in their leaving and climbed the ladder at KPMG by going out sessioning from Thursday to Sunday.

I have little doubt cocaine is rampant in the higher ends of the media, music business, the property developer garish new money types of the 2000's, and other aspects of the arts, but anybody who thinks people as boring as your average former Trinity economics student is hoovering coke all weekend needs a reality check.

mikethecop

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118223836#Comment_118223836

have you not seen america ? not aware of the massive damage prescribed meds already do in Ireland ?

B.A._Baracus

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118225698#Comment_118225698

Good point!

To be honest I shake my head when ever the topic of legalising drugs comes up. Like people have notions that everything will be better if legal. There'd still be scumbag dealers selling a cheaper drug.

Sure what do they say, the more things change the more they stay the same.

Graces7

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118232436#Comment_118232436

Please explain your last sentence as I am sure I must have misunderstood it. Thank you

Graces7

When I was trading at a market in a small town, a few of the stallholders were chatting as it was quiet. I am old and limp when I walk, and we got talking re dealing with pain. I mentioned prescription codeine . Someone had already whispered to me that one of the stall holders sold illegal drugs. This lady came up to me and told me that she could sell me ?? cannot remember the name.. cheaper than codeine. Quite openly in the market. As I told her, I get my prescriptions free ... That was my first - and last - encounter with a drug pusher!

mikethecop

That prescribed medication already does huge damage in Ireland with out the introduction of oxycodone ?

Graces7

Thanks. But what I meant was what you allege re prescribed meds doing so much harm? Mine are vital to my .... well my life. Valued greatly

breezy1985

“What next? Somebody will be murdered, and then where are we? Drive by shootings in the night, it'll be like Boys n the Hood. And then they'll have hoes selling their wares in the middle of the street and the pimps will be using crack cocaine to keep the whores under control.”