The Phenomenon of Drugs from Legislative Perspective

Abstract

The complex social and health scourge of illegal drugs affects millions of people globally, with enormous negative consequences for both users and their families and communities. Drug use generates huge costs and harms to public health and safety, the environment and labor productivity, it brings with it threats to security, related to violence, crime and corruption; the illicit drug market is one of the main sources of income for organized crime groups, and drug trafficking affects stability and governance. Romanian legislation in the field underwent a significant change through the promulgation of Law 58/2024, which supplements Law 43/2000 and amends Law 194/2011, eliminating the possibility of serving the sentence under supervision in the case of cultivation, offering, sale, transport, purchase and possession of drugs . of high risk and international high-risk drug trafficking, as well as increasing the amount of punishments, in the sense that carrying out operations with products likely to have psychoactive effects constitutes a crime and this is punishable by imprisonment from three to 10 years. In order to combat drug-related crime, Romania seeks to strengthen security means by preventing, deterring and disrupting drug-related crime, through judicial cooperation and in the field of ensuring compliance with the law, operative data, interdiction, confiscation of assets derived from the commission of crimes, investigation and of crimes. border management. This punitive strategy is in dissonance with the new policy of the European Union, promoting public health and controlled legalization of drugs, practically proving that the strategy based on the fight against drugs has failed, exponentially increasing their consumption. The adoption of this philosophy of public health is an international constant, but also an urgent necessity for Romania, which acts as a responsible state, where the health - and not the punishment - of the consumer comes first.