The Michigan House and Senate drew bipartisan support in passing HB 5649 which gives exemption from prosecution for those seeking medical attention or those in the company of someone seeking medical attention for a drug overdose or controlled substance related medical crisis. The current law only allows that protection for people aged 21 or younger and only in the case of prescription controlled substances. HB 5649 removes the age limit and encompasses all controlled substances. It is a small step in mitigating the devastation caused by the drug war in allowing people to feel comfortable seeking treatment in cases of emergency. The right to seek medical attention in a life-threatening situation without prosecution will begin to bridge the gap between substance abuse and healing, a gap blocked by criminalization and mass incarceration. The DEA released a report late last year stating that drug overdoses are the number one cause of injurious death in the United States, ahead of car accidents and firearm death. So it is vital that legislation is passed in order to empower people to feel safe seeking appropriate medical treatment when there is an emergency resulting from drug use.

The war on drugs has had an especially devastating impact on black communities and persons of color. White people use and sell drugs at a higher rate than black people; however, black people are 3.6 times more likely to get arrested for selling drugs. There is also a disparity in sentencing of drug crimes towards black people as they generally serve time equivalent to a white person who has been convicted of a violent crime. In 1971 then President Richard Nixon formally declared a “war on drugs” which began heavy prosecution for drug crimes that has contributed to the United States massive prison population, larger than any other country in the world. The former domestic policy chief to Richard Nixon, John Ehrlichman, recently spoke out in an interview with Dan Baum of Harper's claiming outrageous motivations behind the drug war that has been suspected for so long:

“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

And it worked.

Nearly fifty years later black men are still incarcerated at six times the rate of white men, make up nearly half of the prison population and represent over 80% of those prosecuted under federal law for crack/cocaine, despite making up less than a third of crack/cocaine users. These laws, created under the guise of protecting innocent Americans from dangerous drug criminals, have done nothing to address the issues of drug abuse and have contributed to systemic racism that has resulted in the silence surrounding an entire population being targeted for imprisonment.

The drug war also contributed to the stigma against drug users; however, drug users include a large population who have endured trauma or is suffering from PTSD. Drug abuse risk factors include: genetics, mental illness, depression, anxiety, loneliness, and difficult family situations. People who abuse drugs are often in emotional, mental, or physical distress and abusing in order to escape that pain. So long as we have the stereotype that drug abusers are monsters, lowlifes, and criminals we distance ourselves from the humanity it takes to care for someone who is suffering. We can no longer look away as our prisons continue to fill with non-violent drug users. It is not morally acceptable to punish traumatized people for using self-harming coping mechanisms.

This bill is on track to reach Governor Snyder's desk to be signed into law; it is a step in the right direction in allowing people who are in crisis the ability to seek medical attention without consequence. As much promise for helping those in crisis that this legislation has, the bill was not without it's vocal critics. Senator Patrick Colbeck (R-Canton) spoke against the bill on Thursday. As transcribed in Michigan's Journal of the Senate:

“That age limit removal, make no mistake, results in a defacto legalization of illegal drug use. All you have to do is make sure you take enough drugs, or the person that you’re with at a party, that you are going to go off and identify as taking too many drugs. All you have to do is take enough of the drugs to get hospitalized and be in an emergency condition. And if you keep on doing that you are going to keep on getting these get out of jail free cards. At what point does grace, giving grace, become enablement?”

Giving grace is not enabling when it is given during a life-threatening situation. It is also not clear as to why someone would commit a crime by purchasing drugs to then intentionally overdose to get hospitalized for a medical emergency, risking death in order to legally ingest the illegally obtained drugs. This bill is not an exploitable loophole, it does not make all drug use legal — it only gives lawful protection in emergencies, when people are at their most vulnerable. With drug overdose being the leading cause of injurious death it is essential that we eliminate any legal factor that may be contributing to it.

Recently, photos of two people allegedly passed out after heroin use with a young child in the back seat have circulated the internet courtesy of the East Liverpool Police Department in Ohio. They have sparked a discussion on drug epidemics facing our country as well as the morality of posting graphic, uncensored photos of unconscious people and a small child. The department wrote:

“The poison known as heroin has taken a strong grip on many communities not just ours, the difference is we are willing to fight this problem until it’s gone and if that means we offend a few people along the way we are prepared to deal with that.”

While the photos are shocking and are certainly sparking a discussion, it continues a narrative that vilifies drug users. Endangering a child is heinous and should be punished accordingly; the tragedy that is heroin use and the impact it has on others can be harrowing to watch, but to actually work to end and prevent it involves making changes to how we approach it. What has been happening is not working: heroin use has nearly doubled in young adults in the past decade and numbers continue to rise. The drug war has not stopped an increase of drug use, it has contributed to our overcrowded prison system. Criminalizing drug use does not break the cycle, treatment does. Drugabuse.gov advises the following treatments for drug addiction:

• detoxification (the process by which the body rids itself of a drug)
• behavioral counseling
• medication (for opioid, tobacco, or alcohol addiction)
• evaluation and treatment for co-occurring mental health issues such as depression and anxiety
• long-term follow-up to prevent relapse

The government knows what exactly treats drug addiction, so why do we arrest people instead?

Why do we shame and vilify them on social media? These aren't solving anything. The money used to maintain our extraordinarily high prison population could alternatively be used to provide more mental health services and recovery programs. Mental health is a common dialouge in politics and social media discussions, it seems that tackling the issues of access, quality care, and affordability would combat a lot of different problems in our country. We can prosecute people for the harm they cause others, such as with child endangerment, without having to prosecute people for harming themselves.

As important as this legislation is, there is still much more to be done by way of treating the problems of drug abuse. Funding and availability of mental health is crucial in ending the dependence on controlled substances, because it is through solving the problem of whypeople turn to drugs that we will prevent and heal drug use. We also need to change how we look at drugs and the people that use them; many people still condemn marijuana despite the growing body of evidence that it is a medicinally beneficial and poses far less risk and consequence as alcohol. The conversation continues to centralize around the legitimacy of marijuana, while prescription painkillers are the number one cause of drug overdose in our country, surpassing heroin, MDMA, cocaine, methamphetamine and PCP combined. As long as we continue to make drug use taboo by stigmatizing users and give drug use harsher punishment than violent crime (see Brock Turner) we endanger some of our most vulnerable citizens and create criminals out of people we should be helping. Mass incarceration and drug laws targeting specific populations are national crises, drug overdose is the number one unnatural killer in our country and these issues deserve to be discussed and acted upon in a rational, empathetic way.

Read the full bill, as passed by the Michigan Senate, here.

Watch Senator Colbeck's full explanation here.