Women not only face unique stigmatization for their drug use, but are disproportionately affected by laws and regulations regarding drug use and social reform. It has been argued that the ‘war on drugs’ has become a war on women.

Women are the fastest growing segment of the US prison population. From 1986 (the year that mandatory sentencing was enacted) to 1996, the number of women sentenced to state prison for drug crimes boomed from around 2,370 to 23,700. This is largely because women are considerably more likely than men to be convicted of non-violent offenses and most drug related offenses are non-violent. Almost 80 percent of the female prison population is incarcerated for drug offences. Women frequently serve as couriers or other low-level functionaries in drug operations and often work for their partner, sometimes unwittingly or out of fear. Consequently, women either possess little information to offer prosecutors, or refuse to provide evidence against their husband or boyfriend in return for a lighter sentence - these women commonly serve longer prison sentences than the men who are key organizers. Instead of a policy of last resort, imprisonment has become the first order response for a wide range of women offenders. This politically motivated legislative response to social drug issues often ignores the fiscal or social costs of imprisonment, thus missing opportunities to prevent women's crime through social service and educational programs.

Less than 11 percent of women who need drug treatment receive it. In the 1980's with the advent of the media generated crack epidemic, women, particularly pregnant women, became the target of punitive law enforcement efforts. Misleading media stories reported that use of cocaine during pregnancy caused significant and irreparable damage to the developing fetus. Spurred by these sensational and often inaccurate articles legislators in the mid 1980s began to introduce legislative proposals addressing the subject. For example, as a result of a judicial decision in South Carolina, a pregnant woman who uses an illicit drug may be prosecuted as a child abuser and sentenced to ten years in jail. Her use of drugs alone provides the basis for presumption of neglect and consideration of terminating parental rights. Mothers who spend time in jail not only face separation from their children but upon release many public benefits can be revoked, reduced, or denied on the basis of their sentence. They may be ineligible for food stamps, Supplemental Security Income and public housing (in many cases for life) – this is especially problematic for women with dependant children.

While men too have suffered in the imprisonment binge, the gender-based difference is prominent and is most apparent among women of color. Since 1986 the overall number of women in prison has increased 400 percent. For black women the rise is 800 percent. Racial profiling is common in police drug operations and despite similar or equal levels of illicit drug use during pregnancy, black women are 10 times more likely than white women to be reported to child welfare agencies for prenatal drug use.

Individual behavior alone cannot fully make sense of these dramatic increases. It is a misguided war on drugs, in particular mandatory sentencing and racial profiling, that accounts for this sudden clash of women and the law.