Recommendations For National Drug Strategy 2027–2036: A Prevention & Recovery Framework (Building Safer, Healthier and more Resilient Communities)

Recommendations For National Drug Strategy 2027–2036: A Prevention & Recovery Framework (Building Safer, Healthier and more Resilient Communities)
Australia stands at a crossroads. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s World DrugReport 2025 confirms what families and communities already know: our current approach to the substances and drugs issue is failing those global demographics. Australia now leads the world in cocaine consumption (per capita) and has ‘by far the highest’ global prevalence of ecstasy use. Our cannabis use is three times the global average among school students. Over 40% of Australians in drug treatment are there for methamphetamine, the highest proportion globally. Most concerning, 55% of those in treatment are under 35 years of age.
These statistics represent real people: sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers, community members with unfulfilled potential. Behind each number is a family in crisis, a childhood disrupted, a future compromised.
Yet we know what works. Between 1998 and 2007, Australia’s ‘Tough on Drugs’ policy achieved a 39% reduction in illicit drug use and a 67% reduction in opiate deaths. Sweden reduced student drug use by 80%. Iceland achieved 60–90% reductions. Prevention policies actually implemented and followed up on produce a $12.88 saving in future damage management costs for every dollar invested.
The evidence is clear: prevention works, recovery is possible and productive, children can be protected, and families must be educated and equipped to that end.
This policy brief is a priority option for the National Drug Strategy 2027–2036, which returns to evidence-based prevention as the foundation of drug policy. It prioritises protecting children, supporting comprehensive recovery, and building drug-use-declining communities. It honours Australia’s international obligations under Article 33 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the most ratified UN treaty in history.
We can no longer afford policies that normalise drug use while claiming to reduce its harms. The time for a seriously resourced and thoroughly implemented prevention and recovery framework has come.