The street life of drugs
CMAJ 1999;160;25
See response from: S. Grzybowski, A. Sajan; B. Goldman
The article by Amin Sajan and colleagues1 [full text] and the associated editorial by Brian Goldman2 [full text] comment on the robust street market for prescription drugs. Goldman suggests that the answer is not to be found in increased regulation, but I would go further and suggest that we look at some of the systemic factors that underlie the perpetuation of this phenomenon.
There are inexorable links between the abuse of licit drugs and the abuse of illicit ones. Many argue that criminalization of drug addiction has helped create the social deviant subculture3 as well as the endemic system of violence4,5 that regulates it. In some cases a market is created because there is a lack of accessible addiction treatment. If we ignore or do not respond to such systemic factors in the creation of a market, the economics of necessity will prevail to maintain the status quo.
Mark Latowsky, MD
Department of Family
and Community Medicine
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ont.
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References
- Sajan A, Corneil T, Grzybowski S. The street value of prescription drugs. CMAJ 1998;159(2):139-42.
- Goldman B. The news on the street: prescription drugs on the black market [editorial]. CMAJ 1998;159(2):149-50.
- Goode E. Deviant behaviour: an interactionist approach. Englewood Cliffs (NJ): Prentice-Hall; 1978. p. 288-9.
- Goldstein P. Drugs and violent crime. In: Weiner N, Wolfgang M, editors. Pathways to criminal violence. Beverly Hills (CA): Sage; 1989.
- Goldstein P. The drugs/violence nexus: a tripartate conceptual framework. J Drug Issues 1985;21(2):345-67.
