By: Shawna Logue

If you say you’ve never known someone dealing with opioids, now you do. People dealing with this are people that you know. I was in an accident, and I specifically asked the doctor if Tramadol was an opioid. I was told no, just a narcotic. The doctor did not realize it was the #1 prescribed opioid. Often people in this position turn to heroin or non-prescribed pills when they are no longer allowed the prescription and a method of detoxing from these has not been implemented. Opioids, or any other addiction, is not a junkie under a bridge problem. It is a parental issue. It is a grandparent, child, friend, etc. issue. It is not a poor versus rich or college educated versus not issue. This is a world issue. This is a human issue.

Out of our 6 million Danish citizens, 33,000 are addicts: 6 percent of the population. Another Member State has nearly 49 million addicts out of a 333 million population: 15 percent. Of those addicts, 2 million are incarcerated and 47 percent of those are for drug offenses specifically. That is only counting convictions, not charges. Denmark is down 7 percent on our addiction and incarceration rates. This is because we prioritize addiction as a public health issue, not a criminal issue. If we all prioritized rehabilitation over criminalization, we could all be down 7 percent or more in both categories because of the cooperation. 

The average incarceration costs $47,057 per person. The average taxes paid in a Member State is $17,902 per person; in Denmark it is €9,000. The average prison stay worldwide is two to five years. The average cost of drug rehabilitation is $13,500 per person. You can clearly see from the math that if people are out and about and doing well through prevention and recovery, it is more profitable and beneficial to not incarcerate.