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From the beginning, tobacco, alcohol, opium or even cannabis, were considered unsafe products which justified high taxation, state control or prohibition. It is only with the international movement against opium and narcotics in the early twentieth century that this “comprehensive” approach disappears in favor of a focus on products rather than on behavior. Public policies then diverge around two conflicting objectives: to promote the supply of drugs, for economic or tax reasons or, conversely, fight against drug supply for moral reasons first, then health. The author analyzes two centuries of drug legislation, until the promulgation of the Health Law, in 2016.