2003-07-13

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The Observer | Special reports | We have lost the war on drugs

This is a government committed to 'evidence-based policy'. Its favourite question is 'what works?' But policy on drugs is not following this dictum and most of it is being made in ignorance. There is much we don't know. It is thought that drug crime is costing up to £20 billion a year, that drug-related crime accounts for 50 per cent of all offences and that possibly 80 per cent of prisoners are heroin or cocaine users.