Religious values and perspectives have an important influence on attitudes towards drug abuse and trafficking. Elements of the Muslim community, mainly in the Western Cape, launched a self-defence movement known as People Against Gangsterism And Drugs (PAGAD) in 1995 because of frustration with police ineffectiveness in dealing with the related problems of violent crime and drug abuse in many townships. South Africa`s fight against drugs was mainly directed against wholesalers and trade unions, while local police rarely focused on retail traders. Very little police time is spent curbing the exchange of drugs between cannabis sellers and buyers in public places. Nevertheless, South Africa reports about 100 drug-related arrests per 100,000 population (SAPS 2005). Most counter-narcotics initiatives in the South African context focus on countering drug trafficking networks, conducting major drug crises and “successful” law enforcement. A newspaper article (Eliseev & Maughan, 2006) on the marijuana market on the streets of Yeoville in Johannesburg notes that police patrols in the area pay little attention to drug transactions between traffickers and buyers. The report points out that even when police are careful, most street vendors and shoppers almost always manage to evade arrest. Law enforcement agencies appear to be on the lookout for current production and seizure trends. There does not appear to be a clear or official redefinition of the application of cannabis and Mandrax to crack, heroin and club drugs. This report summarizes the available epidemiological data on current drug use and drug abuse treatment in South Africa since 1994 and how changes in political, economic and social structures in South Africa before and after apartheid make the country more vulnerable to drug use.
According to national surveys, current cannabis use ranged from 2 per cent to 9 per cent among adolescents and 2 per cent among adults, cocaine/crack cocaine (0.3 per cent), mandrax/tranquilizers (0.3 per cent), club drugs/amphetamine-type stimulants (0.2 per cent), opiates (0.1 per cent) and hallucinogens (0.1 per cent). The main illicit substance to be admitted to South African drug treatment centres was cannabis (16.9 per cent), methamphetamine (tik) 12.8 per cent, crack/cocaine 9.6 per cent, cannabis and mandrax 3.4 per cent, heroin/opiates 9.2 per cent and prescription and over-the-counter drugs 2.6 per cent. There has been an increase in drug treatment. Although the prevalence of illicit drug use in South Africa is relatively low compared to the United States and Australia, prevention and intervention measures need to be designed to reduce these levels by targeting the most at-risk sub-populations identified in this review. Another trend is the proliferation of dangerous “drug cocktails” that appear in the country, such as “Nyaope” or “Whoonga”, which contain a mixture of substances such as heroin, marijuana, rat poison, methamphetamine, laundry detergents and antiretroviral drugs or ARVs (source). As presented in many cases in our center, include people who use multiple substances or addictions to polysubstances. Today, media reports on drug problems in this country often provoke panic reactions. Journalism often replicates the exaggeration and moralism that have shaped public opinion here for more than a century. Narratives that sometimes exaggerate or even mislead the public about new forms of substances that cross borders or the behaviours they claim to cause have had very negative consequences. This included fuelling xenophobic sentiments and stigma associated with drug addicts. The need to reduce both the supply of and demand for illicit drugs should be supported by empirical evidence for a wide range of policies and programmes.
But, as in most African societies, significant funding for drug research is limited by many competing priorities facing the South African government (housing, education, healthcare, etc.). This means a significant lack of information about illicit drugs and treatment outcomes. The limited research, which examined trends in drug use after 1994, focused primarily on adolescents and their alcohol use. The South African government does not have an agency like the US NIDA, which provides sustainable funding to specifically support research projects that investigate illicit drug use. The duplication of some services and the lack of other services (such as funding for innovative research) have meant that scarce resources are poorly managed and others cannot be provided. The absence of a unified strategic response to the drug problem, based on empirical evidence, means that the war on drugs has not been waged effectively or on all fronts. Public concern and pressure to act on illicit drugs has increased. Law enforcement, addiction researchers and service providers agree that the nature and extent of illicit drug trafficking, illicit drug use and related problems appear to be increasing in South Africa, largely due to the political, economic and social changes that have taken place in the country. In light of the previous discussion and its vision of building a drug-free society and contributing to the global problem of drug abuse, the present paper proposes that South Africa: The price evolution of illicit drugs in South Africa has shown some changes since the mid-1990s that have contributed to the general availability and increased demand for less common drugs of choice. While the price of SAR in US dollars has remained relatively stable, the price of heroin and cocaine fell by more than 75% between 1992 and 2001. This meant that a much wider range of users could afford these illicit drugs, which were previously outside their price range.
This decline in prices has a negative impact, as a much wider range of users could afford drugs that were previously outside their price range and the potential for increased drug use in low-income country and youth markets (UNODC, 2002, 2006). After 1994, South Africa experienced an increase in the illicit drug market. The porosity of the country`s borders, particularly with neighbouring countries, relatively high income levels and long-standing and growing income disparities have made South Africa attractive to local and international drug trafficking syndicates. Compared to other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, South Africa represents the largest market for illicit drugs. The rapidly changing social and economic climate, combined with the increasing availability and promotion of drugs and the demand for drugs, has contributed to the growing scale of the national drug abuse problem. The complexity of the problem has been exacerbated by changing patterns of drug abuse, supply and distribution. There is an increase in social and economic factors that make people, especially youth, more vulnerable and likely to use drugs and engage in drug-related risk behaviours. South Africa suffers from the consequences of drug abuse and illicit trafficking: negative health effects; an increase in crime, violence and corruption. The reality is that people do not openly admit that they are addicted to drugs and alcohol, and what they do know is that addiction is prevalent in a wide range of “socially accepted” and widely used substances (alcohol, prescription drugs). According to three national adolescent surveys, lifetime illicit drug use was highest for over-the-counter and prescription drugs (16%), followed by inhalants (range 0.2-11.1%), club drugs (0.2-7.6%), cocaine (crack) (0.1-6.4%), mandrax/tranquilizers (0.1-6.4%) and opiates (11.5%) (the latter figure from the 2002 YRBS appears to be unreasonably high). Use in the past three months appears to be well below 1% for most of these drugs in the general population samples. Less than 0.3% of adult females reported using drugs other than cannabis in the past three months.
There were gender differences: more adolescents than adolescent girls were using inhalants, mandrax/tranquilizers, club drugs and cocaine (crack) (see Table 4). You may think that “possession” means having the drug with you. But that`s not how the law sees it. Chapter IV, section 20, of the Drugs and Drug Trafficking Act 1992 provides: The penalty for trafficking in addictive substances also varies depending on whether the drug is considered merely addictive or dangerously addictive (Schedule 2, Part 1 or Part 2). South Africa is the most urbanized country in sub-Saharan Africa and the only country where more than half of the population is registered as urban (55.4 per cent in 1996). Gauteng (96.4%) (Johannesburg/Pretoria) and the Western Cape (Cape Town) are the most urbanised provinces and have the highest rates of substance abuse.