Subject(s)
Drug Costs , Drug and Narcotic Control , Pharmaceutical Preparations , Private Sector , Public SectorABSTRACT
Comparing the development of drug policy between different countries; and using the example of Nigeria and Jamaica in particular; it becomes evident that measures allowing for the augmentation of state powers are particularly liable to fall prey to the pathologies of state weakness and autocratic governance. This has deleterious results for public health; good governance; protection of the family and other values that they were first introduced to defend. Countries with military governments and poor records of governance are more liable to abuse the powers invested in theirdrug control agencies. Countries with functioning democracies are under pressure to develop medical and community based forms of intervention and have the space for public action to deliver policy shifts before a crisis point is reached
Subject(s)
Drug and Narcotic Control , Health Policy , Nigeria , Public HealthABSTRACT
Beginning in the 1980's the trafficking in and use of narcotics has reached epidemic proportions in Nigeria. In 1987; more Nigerians were arrested abroad for trafficking in hard drugs than all other African nationals. An increasing number of Nigerians are still being arrested at the Nigerian airport with greater weight of drugs in spite of stiff penalties; and the drugs are now freely sold on the streets of the large metropolis