Addiction is a disease and should only be a health issue and not a criminal issue.

(In the previous round, Pro and Con were supposed to present arguments in support of their respective positions. This round was for rebuttals. However, I cannot offer rebuttals this round because Con forfeited the last round. So, I will make an additional two points in support of my arguments I made last round. Con may still salvage his position if he wishes by offering his arguments in the next round and his rebuttals. If Con does that, I will use some of my closing argument space to rebut.)First off, please allow me to fix a link from my previous set of sources. Source [7] should have been: http://www.medicinenet.com...I would like to elaborate on a two things. First, please consider the success other countries have when they move away from handling addiction as a criminal issue. Second, please consider the ineffectiveness of addressing addiction as a criminal issue.The U.S. is already looking to other countries that treat addiction as a health issue. [1] U.S. leaders see the successes of those countries and want to emulate that in the U.S. But it's difficult because of the attitude in the U.S. that an addict is just a person who's corrupted and needs to "pull themselves up with their bootstraps". For a more specific example, in the case of Cameron Douglas, a team of doctors filed a brief explaining that his addiction was a disease after the court imposed a harsh sentence on him. [2] Recently, the U.N. addressed the issues:"No one would imagine that enforcing tough legal sanctions on people with a chronic condition such as heart disease could help address that illness or its causes, or help prevent it in others. Criminal justice is clearly not the way forward in dealing with substance use disorders either; putting people with addictions in prison and perpetuating various legal barriers to seeking or providing substance abuse treatment are only hindrances. Addiction is a medical issue, and the member countries of the United Nations will make progress in addressing it when it becomes the full responsibility of their health care systems." [3]All of this points to the benefits that society will achieve when addiction is a health issue and treated like any other disease.Now as to the ineffectiveness of the penal solution, I present a recent study of eleven countries. "We did not in our fact-finding observe any obvious relationship between the toughness of a country’s enforcement against drug possession, and levels of drug use in that country." [4] The result of that study was simple: drug laws don't work. Also, criminal prosecution of drug laws are expensive. For every dollar spent on treatment there is a yield of more than seven dollars in social benefits. This is considering a cost to incarcerate an offender that is in the tens of thousands of dollars, compared to the cost of treatment that was only about four thousand dollars. [5]The health approach is the best approach. Criminal prosecution is futile in treating a disease and it's a fantasy that prosecution is effective. Health intervention aimed at addiction is in use around the world and it works.Sources:[1] http://www.reuters.com... [2] https://www.aclu.org...[3] http://www.drugabuse.gov... [4] http://www.theguardian.com... [5] http://www.prisonpolicy.org...