A new American Civil Liberties Union report was released Thursday on the drug war on women. Statistics show that women drug-offenders are being harmed a great deal, and in some cases, more than men, reports the Associated Press.

The report, “Caught in the Net”, was based on a national conference in New York where sentence-reform activists, criminal justice officials and others to review proposed policy and legislative changes. In result, the report is calling for an increase in treatment programs for women, says that incarceration should be a last resort, and recommends more efforts to maintain ties between mothers in prison and their children. In the report, they also show that:

-Many women are ensnared in drug investigations despite peripheral involvement, sometimes solely because they failed to turn in their partners to police. Sentencing laws fail to consider factors such as physical abuse or economic dependence that may draw women into drug abuse or deter them from notifying authorities of a partner's drug activity.

-Black and Hispanic women are imprisoned for drug offenses at higher rates than white women even though their rates of illegal drug use are comparable. Factors include prosecutors' decisions, policing tactics and selective testing of pregnant minority women for drug use.

Particularly concerning mothers, drug offenders are typically viewed harshly by lawmakers. Shocker.

"It's not just an issue of drugs, but of embedded moral values," says Bruce Bullington, a Florida State University criminologist. "We demonize these women, and it comes back to haunt us in a variety of ways."

Let’s hope that the report will lead to some changes in this fucked up system.