(Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy) "Taking into account our continent’s experience in the fight against the narcotics trade and the seriousness of the problem, the Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy addresses the present statement to our countries’ governments and public opinion, to the United Nations and the international community, proposing a new paradigm based on three main directives:
"• Treating drug users as a matter of public health.
"• Reducing drug consumption through information, education and prevention.
"• Focusing repression on organized crime."
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"To translate this paradigm shift into concrete action, we propose the adoption by Latin America countries of the following initiatives in the framework of a global process of reframing the policies for fighting the use of illicit drugs:
"1. Change the status of addicts from drug buyers in the illegal market to that of patients cared for in the public health system
"2. Evaluate from a public health standpoint and on the basis of the most advanced medical science the convenience of decriminalizing the possession of cannabis for personal use
"3. Reduce consumption through campaigns of information and prevention that can be understood and accepted by young people, who account for the largest contingent of users.
"4. Redirect repressive strategies to the unrelenting fight against organized crime
"5. Reframe the strategies of repression against the cultivation of illicit drugs"

Source

Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, "Drugs and Democracy: Toward a Paradigm Shift" (New York, NY: Open Society Institute, February 2009), pp. 8-10.
http://www.soros.org/initiati…