Drugs, Violence and Trauma in the Colombian Context: A Health Care Point of View of a Human Rights Challenge

The impact of violence due to illicit drugs markets varies tremendously in magnitude and characteristics depending on several factors. In Colombia, drugs and trauma are related in multiple ways. From interpersonal violence at the street level to the criminal actions of various armed groups whose violent campaigns are financed through the vast profits associated with the illicit drug market. The objective of this review is to analyze the association of the illicit drugs trade and its impact on violence in Colombia from the viewpoint of healthcare providers who care for trauma patients. Injuries related to drug traffic violence are high in Colombia, and only a small reduction was obtained after severe crime enforcement policies. The societal cost of the war on drugs policy is high on trauma deaths and related disabilities according to several reports from non-government agencies and the Colombian National Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences. A health care initiative in order to understand the drug phenomena as a health care problem shifting the actual criminal-justice based on the approach can minimize the human rights crisis that is evolving being faced every day at health care facilities in Colombia. This new approach in the actual post-conflict environment deserves to be analyzed.