For more than three decades, Czech drug policy has stood out for its integrated, interdisciplinary approach. Rather than treating drug use solely as a health issue or a criminal justice concern, the Czech system has combined prevention, harm reduction, treatment, social reintegration, and market regulation.
However, the government recently decided to transfer the coordination of drug policy from the Office of the Government to the Ministry of Health, a move that experts and civil society are concerned will end this multidisciplinary approach to drug issues.
A model built on integration
The Czech drug policy model centres around the Government Council for Addiction Policy Coordination and its Secretariat, located within the Office of the Government. This institutional placement has enabled coordination across ministries, ensuring that health, social, educational, and security aspects of drug policy are addressed together.
This approach has delivered measurable results. Czechia has consistently reported low rates of HIV, hepatitis C transmission, and deaths among people who inject opioids due to early adoption of harm reduction; this has helped keep the prevalence of other communicable diseases and drug-related mortality low. Much of Europe’s struggles to grapple with the harms of new psychoactive substances, especially synthetic opioids, have mostly been avoided in Czechia.
A controversial restructuring
In May 2026, the Czech government approved a broader restructuring plan to move several policy agendas from the Office of the Government to individual ministries. As part of this reorganisation, responsibility for drug policy and mental health is set to shift to the Ministry of Health.
The change is expected to take effect from the start of July; this shift would be followed by a change in leadership: the current national drug policy coordinator, Pavel Bém, who helped build the existing drug policy system thirty years ago, is expected to vacate the position.
Government representatives have framed the move as a matter of efficiency. However, critics argue that this realignment risks undermining the very strengths of the Czech model – its cross-sectoral coordination and ability to work independently to any single ministry. In fact, earlier this month, specialists working in addiction services held a symbolic strike to protest the government move.
The controversial decision has also been welcomed by parts of law enforcement, particularly the National Drug Headquarters. According to Czech media, the government is increasingly aligning itself with police perspectives favouring stricter control measures on drugs, particularly when it comes to reviewing the recently adopted legal regulation of psychomodulatory substances like kratom. This may signal a departure from the country’s traditionally balanced approach toward a more punitive, enforcement-led model.
Concerns within the system
Pavel Bém himself has publicly criticised the decision, warning that drug policy cannot be reduced to a single sector. He has stressed that addiction policy spans health, social services, education, security, and economic regulation—and therefore requires coordination at the highest level of government.
Bém also warned that the proposed transfer could lead to the “disintegration of a system built over decades,” with potential consequences including reduced effectiveness of services, increased harms, and even the emergence of more severe drug-related crises.
In a recent interview, Bém suggested he understood the administrative rationale behind the decision, noting that interdepartmental agendas can appear complex and difficult to manage. Yet he also emphasised that this complexity is precisely what makes the current system effective, as it’s able to reflect the multifaceted nature of drugs and addiction. Bém also highlighted the cost-effectiveness of the Czech model – famously summarising it as delivering “a lot of music for little money”.
The concerns are not limited to drug policy alone. The broader restructuring has triggered criticism across multiple sectors, with experts threatening to resign from government advisory bodies and warnings that the changes could weaken independent, evidence-based policymaking.
Wider backlash
In response to this news, professionals, academics and experts working in the alcohol and drugs sector, including former Czech national drug policy coordinators and the former Director of the European Drugs Agency, signed an open letter calling on the Prime Minister to preserve the current interdisciplinary model of Czech drug policy, which is open to signatures by the professional and expert community.
The letter underscores Czechia’s successes in drug-related public health outcomes and concerns around the centralisation of drug work under one particular ministry. It recommends the state to maintain and build upon existing system strengths that have kept the worst of drug harms out of Czechia, keeping its health systems and people safe from unnecessary harms.
For decades, Czechia has been pioneering drug policy advances in Europe, shaping policy around cannabis, synthetic cannabinoids and psychedelic drug access, and experimenting with control over other emerging substances.
It is a rare example of a model of drug policy that addresses the multifaceted and complex nature of drug use and addiction, with impressive results. An overhaul to the system threatens to undo decades of hard-won progress and undermine a system that could serve as a model across the continent.
