Drug Policy Reform: Have We Won Yet?

Last month more than 1,000 drug policy reformers gathered in Denver, Colorado, to count their victories.

Activists from Washington and Colorado celebrated the passage of the first marijuana regulatory systems in the world. Public health experts from New Zealand shared a bold new approach to legal highs that is poised to curb the explosion of designer drugs appearing on the market. And a number of public officials described the effects of pioneering programs like safe consumption facilities, peer-based naloxone distribution, and alternatives to incarceration for minor drug offenses.

The victories celebrated in Denver are historic and the key to these successes have been the movement’s rich diversity. Groups who support drug policy reform range from students to scholars, from parents to police, from religious leaders to rap artists.

All of these voices were represented in Denver.

Please watch highlights from the 2013 International Drug Policy Reform Conference prepared by the HCLU’s Drugreporter film team and share with your networks.

We need you to communicate with your networks to help us advance better drug policies. The conference in Denver showed us how far we’ve come. But there’s still a long way to go before we can truly claim the drug war is over.