The Minnesota Medical Association (MMA) has recently released a resolution calling for the removal of penalties for possession of small amounts of illicit drugs as well as promoting statewide harm reduction programs, reported Marijuana Moment.
The measure was passed by the MMA’s board of trustees on to the association’s Policy Council for consideration and was finally approved after a full member vote with results 219 to 34.
The association’s board formed a task force to study harm reduction models and finally adopted the dual approach of decriminalization with treatment referral similar to the one already ongoing in other places such as Portugal.
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As such, the proposal calls for more investment in harm reduction and medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD) programs as well as low-level drug possession pardons and expungements.
A draft of the proposal obtained by Marijuana Moment states that while criminal penalties for simple possession “yield one potential benefit to population health in its claimed ability to deter drug use, (…) there is insufficient evidence to support this claim.”
That document further adds that “criminal penalties for simple possession yield numerous, real harms to population health,” including but not limited to arrests, convictions, incarcerations, criminal records, diverted public investment and so “the MMA concludes that criminal penalties for simple possession in Minnesota are unjustified.”
Such robust support could certainly end up influencing the state’s drug reform discussion in the upcoming 2023 sessions.
The proposal includes the possibility of the association educating policymakers on “the inefficacy of criminal penalties for simple possession as a deterrent of drug use” and urges them to monitor data out of jurisdictions where simple possession has been decriminalized illustrating “how decriminalization may or may not correlate with trends in drug-induced morbidity and mortality.”
Photo by Pretty Drugthings on Unsplash
Image and article originally from www.benzinga.com. Read the original article here.