Health and the use of illicit drugs Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Health and the use of illicit drugs - Essay Example Many countries, all over the world, including Australia, have categorized illicit drug use as one of the health issues and many laws and policies have been formulated and enforced to check illicit drug intake. However, statistics show that the problem continues and more and more people are falling prey to the consequences of drug abuse (NDS, 2008). The Australian government has put illicit drug abuse under health agenda because of various contemporary pressures and influences, the details of which will be elaborated in the discussion below. Amongst all the countries in the world, Australia is at the forefront as far as drug policing is concerned (NDS, 2008). The National Drug Strategy (NDS) was implemented in 1985 (NDS, 2008) and has steered the comprehensive approach to the harmful use of illicit drugs. It has been launched through cooperation of Australian, state and territory governments. The 3 main policies endorsed by the Australian government to tackle illicit drug abuse are reduction of demand, reduction of supply and reduction of harm (Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy, 2004). The most important policy is the harm reduction policy which is actually a safety net to the other two policies (Zadjow, 2005). and involves strategies to prevent the harmful effects of drug abuse both to the person and the society. The National Drugs Campaign (NDC, 2009) is a nation-wide programme with aims and objectives to bring down the motivation of young Australians for consumption of illicit drugs. The Ministry for Health and Ag eing of the Australian government has developed and endorsed many more strategies to tackle illicit drug abuse, some of which in the recent years are "National Amphetamine-Type Stimulant Strategy 2008-2011", "Management of Patients with Psychostimulant Use Problems. Guidelines for General Practitioners updated 2007", "The Intergovernmental Committee on Drugs National Drug Strategic Framework", "Barriers and Incentives to Treatment for Illicit