Abstract
Since 1990, illicit drug problems in the United States have come more from methamphetamines and opioids than from the traditional drugs heroin, cocaine, marijuana. The newer drugs and the efforts to restrict them have in some ways echoed the patterns of past drug problems, but the newer drugs' greater strength and, in particular, the fact that they can be manufactured rather than needing to be grown have also created new challenges. US government policy continues to rely on a supply-side, “war on drugs” approach, meaning the same problems continue even as new ones arise.