Thomas McLellan was Barack Obama’s addiction advisor. He co-directed the equivalent of the Mildeca and shares with Danièle Jourdain Menninger similar thoughts on criminal drug policy.
When it comes to drugs, each country has its vision, its legislation – and its Mildeca. On the other side of the Atlantic, in the United States, the equivalent of this interministerial body is the “Office of National Drug Control Policy”. From 2009 to 2010, this office, placed under the supervision of the President of the Republic, had as deputy director Thomas McLellan, then addiction advisor to Barack Obama.
We met this Professor of Psychiatry in Paris, during the Albatross Congress, an international addictology meeting organized by CERTA (Center for Education, Research and Treatment of Addictions), on June 19, 2015. The opportunity to come back to the American situation, when several American states have taken the leap to legalize cannabis. The occasion, also, to measure the prudence which surrounds the reflection at the federal level, like France.
“Do we need new drugs?”
Thomas McLellan worked in the Obama administration at a crucial time – in the midst of health care reform (“Obamacare”). He instilled a drug policy based on a humanist, pragmatic and scientific approach – a thousand leagues from the “War on Drugs” which marked the last decades in the United States, with catastrophic results (imprisonment massive number of users; failures of medico-social care; lack of prevention and early intervention, etc.). He is the one who made drug use disorders one of the ten essential elements of public health, and as such are reimbursed by insurance companies that work with Medicare.
If the comparison is not correct, certain parallels can be drawn between the visions of Thomas McLellan and Danièle Jourdain Menninger. Both have given themselves the mission of “changing mentalities” in a progressive and educational way, without rushing the spirits so as not to reinforce ideological positions. However, the characters express the same reservations about permissive policies.
“I don’t think legalization is a good way,” says Thomas McLellan. All the drugs that were legalized in the past have been overused afterwards – alcohol, cigarettes. Do you really believe that companies need to be supplied with new drugs? “. On the other hand, his opinion on the criminalization of use is very clear: “I cannot support the arrest and incarceration of consumers, whatever the substance. I am in favor of decriminalizing the use of all drugs ”.
Thomas McLellan, former president of the ONDCP: Interview on drug policy in the United States, conducted on June 19, 2015 at the Albatross addictology congress (Paris)
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