Posted on December 13, 2011

Former Brazilian President, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, has posed the question, "Would legal regulation and control of drugs better protect children?" in a recent news article. Cardoso feels strongly about the subject of protecting children and how drug law reform affects them. He has made several recommendations on the subject.

In the article, Cardoso highlights his belief that the best interests of children should be the primary consideration of all the policies affecting them. The former president adds that the current approaches have failed at trying to protect children from drug harms and drug use. He calls for several issues to be debated such as how controlling drugs and legal regulations would affect children. Cardoso remains convinced the recommendations of such policies from the Global Commission would have important benefits for young people.

However, Cardoso does urge caution when it comes to business dealings in the future concerning illicit drugs. It has been his experience in dealing with corporations for tobacco and alcohol that their priorities are in maximizing profits and not public health. He emphasizes the need to protect our children stating that we cannot let drugs carry over into the criminal market or to an unregulated market.

Cardoso’s article is a challenge to activists, politicians and researchers and is no doubt controversial. He believes the current policies have caused children harm due to disregard, negligence and carelessness on the part of policy makers. Cardoso added that the policies affecting children, as shown in the Rights of the Child from the UN Convention, should focus on children being at the forefront of the policy discussions on drugs.

Cardoso, along with Professor Gerry Stimson of the International Journal of Drug Policy, believe an open environment should be created to safely discuss these issues in order to best serve the children.