Problemas con las drogas

Drug Problems in Europe
On 05 November 2009, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) launched its Annual Report on the state of drug problems in Europe. Based on 2007data from the EU Member States, candidate countries, Croatia, Norway and Turkey, the eight chapters of the report present an overview of the drug phenomenon.

Overview of the report

Chapter onefocuses on policies and law regarding drugs as a whole, Chapter two presents an overview of responses to drug problems in Europe through prevention, treatment, harm reduction, social reintegration, lawenforcement, and health and social responses in prison. The next three chapters portray the patterns of cannabis, amphetamines, ecstasy, hallucinogenic substances, cocaine and crack cocaine use.Finally the two last chapters (Chapter seven and Chapter eight) propose an outline of drug-related infectious diseases and deaths, as well as, new drugs and emerging trends.

Europe is dealing with anincreased sophisticated drug market

Due to the illegal nature of drugs, data on the drug market and trafficking are lacking. The data that does exist is not always disseminated successful, however,some trends are clear : cannabis consumption is decreasing, the spread of cocaine and heroin is increasing and the internet is becoming increasingly used as a tool for the circulation of information andgoods.

Wolfgang Götz, Director of the EMCDDA, stated that, “The past year has been an important one for drug policy, at European and global level. Almost in parallel, the European Union and theUnited Nations both renewed their drug policy documents, which reflect a strong international commitment to reducing drug use and the harms it can cause. Attaining the goals set out in these documentsnow constitutes a major challenge and one that can only be met if the actions planned are implemented widely. Monitoring and evaluation are key elements in this process, as they allow policies to be...