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A WORLD OF HARM: How U.S. Taxpayers Fund the Global War on Drugs Over Evidence-Based Health Responses
Key Excerpts from Article on Website of Harm Reduction International
Posted: October 26th, 2025
https://hri.global/publications/a-world-of-harm/
Since 1971, the U.S. has spent more than a trillion dollars on the war on drugs, prioritising law enforcement responses and fuelling mass incarceration within its borders. It has also played a leading role in pushing and funding punitive responses to drugs internationally. This has continued despite clear evidence that such approaches don’t work to achieve their stated aims (ending drug use and sales) while having devastating effects on rights and health, including mass criminalisation, disease transmission, repression and displacement. The U.S. government spends more on international “counternarcotics” activities than it does on education, water supply, sanitation, and women’s rights in low- and middle-income countries: Almost $13 billion of U.S. taxpayer money has been allocated to “counternarcotics” activities internationally since 2015. This amount is more than the U.S. government spent over that decade on primary education or water supply and sanitation in low- and middle-income countries. Funding meant to end global poverty is going to “counternarcotics” activities. A growing amount of this “counternarcotics cash” has even come from the same U.S. official development assistance budgets that are supposed to help end global poverty. Funding for “narcotics control” and “counternarcotic activities” has resulted in human rights abuses, rising HIV rates, aerial fumigation with toxic chemicals, and militarised responses in various regions.
Note: Don't miss our in-depth investigation into the dark truths behind the War on Drugs. For more along these lines, read our concise summaries of news articles on health and the War on Drugs.
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