I agree Alan, and I would add to that the people who run the betting industry and those who work in it.

Gambling addiction can be the worst addiction of all.
It can ruin the lives of anyone associated with the addicted person.
When gambling addiction is added to alcohol or drug addiction, you are in real nightmare territory.

There are no easy ways to tackle addiction, erradicating it completely will of course be impossible and very expensive, in money and effort.....The majority taxpayers are unwilling to see their hard earned cash "wasted" on addicts.

There are several ways of looking at the problem, the knee jerk "liberal" approach, advanced by Lox and leveller, who maintain human rights come before all else.....even the welfare of addicts.
The present situation regarding the investigation into the causes of addiction and the treatment of addicts is a disgrace and something needs to be done pretty damned quick. It's obvious that the holding stratagy involving the substitution of methadone for heroin is not working...the rising death rates for addicts tells that story and all who survive become more addicted to the methadone than they were to the heroin.

Guest falco's remedy would be effective, but for it to work, it would require the deaths or incarceration of thousands of people who are themselves victims....the street dealers, the "mules" who have run up debts and are forced by violence to carry drugs to pay of the people who make the real money. They are the "footsoldiers" of the drugs trade, most are a mess of psychiatric problems which have led to their becoming addicted in the first place.

Don't get me wrong there may be no other answer than the one falco proposes, for the last ten years I have been involved with addicts and have watched the problem get steadily worse, through bad practice and the lack of will to make the money available to bring in a proper rehabilitation programme, with psychiatric follow-up.
Added to that we need to find out why so many of our youth feel so "disconnected" from life that they resort to the use of drugs.

We have two choices, we do it falco's way or we spend the billions required to operate a realistic rehabilitation scheme....and no "liberal" politician is likely to accept either option.

I am against the death penalty for almost everything, but I would personally kill drug dealers....of the faceless variety. The ones who do it for the money, not the victims whom we see being prosecuted in our local papers.

Once again the "liberal" option of doing sweet fuck all, is no option at all and merely a cop out for cowards...Ake