There were two articles in the weekend paper regarding violence in the United States and ways to prevent it. In my opinion they both missed one reason for it — drugs.

It seems the fad these days is to blame mental illness, especially for violent crimes. That is good for the health care industry since they will get more patients and the government would have another way to control our lives. But why so many mentally ill people all of a sudden? No one seems to mention the drug problem. When the police stop someone for a traffic violation or go to a home disturbance, they often report that someone was using illegal drugs or some were present. When a violent crime occurs there isn’t a mention of whether the person was using drugs. I believe that it’s a fact that use of these strong drugs can change your way of thinking. I believe that if truth be told, the use of drugs would be the problem in most cases

More and more governments are legalizing stronger drugs these days. Instead every government should outlaw these drugs and heavily penalize the users and distributors. Why try to keep all of those drugs from entering the country when it’s legal to use them?

MARLENE LOZANO

Muncy

Submitted by Virtual Newsroom