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Irina Yarovaya, the chairman of the State Duma Committee on Security and Anti-Corruption
The safety of health, certain rules and norms of behavior, protection by law, public safety measures public dialogue is what will become more and more important with the development of society.
At the moment we are preparing for the second reading a number of very important projects that address precisely the issues of security.
As you know the State Duma in the first reading has adopted our project, of which I and my colleagues on combating drug trafficking are the authors.
A complex of measures that will ensure, above all, prevention.
In general, I believe that together with the measures that establish liability, increase accountability, control measures and supporting measures that have a preventive role should become even more relevant because it is much more important to prevent a crime being committed, since only this can help avoid irreversible victims.
Therefore, the protection of life and health and preventive measures in my opinion are today the main focus of efforts of the state and society.
What preventive measures do we propose in this regard? Today there already exist requirements on the state of health of persons whose activities are directly related to the safety of life and health of citizens.
This concerns law enforcers, those who serve in the armed forces, those who are in charge of objects of high danger, aircraft pilots, machinists, those who have guns today because of their professional activities.
And no doubt one should not be content only with a certificate from a narcological dispensary, it is simply unacceptable because today even the current official information about the number of people held accountable for crimes related to drug trafficking does not correlate with the number of those who are in the official police records.
Of course, this is about the latent consumption of drugs. Today, the early detection, testing and certification of people of these professions would allow, first of all, to ensure the elimination of drug users and thus provision of help to these people in terms of social rehabilitation, medical care, when their diseases have not yet passed the point of no return.
And of course, it would allow for the protection of the citizens of Russia because these people will not have access to jobs, doing which they might engage in illegal activities affecting the lives and health of our citizens.
What is the procedure? The testing procedure involves a doctor's diagnosis, and in case of drug use detection, it certainly results in limiting access to certain professional activities.
But this limitation is not eternal: after information on drug users is directed to the drug control services an investigation will be started, and if there are grounds to apply administrative penalties, for the duration of the administrative penalty the drug user certainly will not be allowed to carry out his professional duties.
In case this person reapplies to any of these professions, he will have to confirm that he is no longer a drug user.
Regarding those procedures which are in force in order to get a license and the first license to drive a vehicle - we all think that we are already fairly secure in terms of security measures, because naturally there everyone has to present a certificate stating that they are healthy and only then can they be allowed to drive a vehicle or hold a license.
But the situation is similar. First of all, a certificate from a narcological dispensary does not provide information on whether the person uses drugs or not, and therefore is not in line with the security measures for which, in fact, it was established.
Therefore, the requirements for those who aspire to obtain gun licenses and driving licenses should not be limited to a certificate from a narcological dispensary but should include a corresponding examination in a narcological dispensary - this is also a basic security measure.
And this is a security measure in a broader sense, because today a great number of well-wishing, law-abiding citizens, including passengers, pedestrians and drivers, are part of the traffic, and of course one cannot allow them to encounter people on the road with intoxication, which could cause accidents and casualties.
Therefore, we believe that such preventive measures which are seemingly simple but very effective, because, and I want to highlight it once again, they will give us the opportunity to detect drug users early on and enable preventive measures to protect the whole of society from possible illegal actions of these individuals.
Our bill which focuses on the so-called "laughing gas" will be considered in the second reading. Did you know that today there is no ban on its use?
The measures that we have proposed for putting it on a special list of goods that should not be sold to minors and young people will also be preventive and safety-ensuring.
Talking about drug users, we feel that the issue of social rehabilitation is no less important and urgent, therefore as you know we have drafted amendments to the law that non-profit organizations, if they meet the requirements proposed by the Ministry of Health, would be able to officially engage in the issues of medical and social rehabilitation.
Moreover, we believe that those individuals who are willing to receive treatment might be subject to release from liability.
Therefore today we see an opportunity in collaboration with the community to find solutions in terms of the social impact on people who actually found themselves in very difficult situations, because drug addiction is, of course, a disease, but we also understand that there is organized crime involved, with lots of money, which is associated with the production and distribution of drugs.
Thus, I would like to remind you that at the beginning of this legislation the main initiative I proposed was connected to reinstating life sentences for drug dealers.