More drug re-classification???

I read with interest a story highlighted on today's Daily Dose, about the probable re-classification of both ecstasy and LSD, from class A to class B. I agree that both of these drugs are less harmful than heroin, cocaine and injecting amphetamine and so yes probably should be in a different, lower class. 

But what I don't agree with, is the way this announcement is going to be portrayed in the media. We will have scaremongering stories, sensationalist in nature, all describing ecstasy and LSD as the nastiest things since Hitler, indeed The Sun has already started, quoting headlines from 2001 and 1995, of two deaths linked to ecstasy. Stories from 7 and 13 years ago? If that is not scaremongering, I don't know what is!

The 'street' ecstasy of today isn't what it used to be, even 5-10 years ago ( I sound like my Grandfather talking about the old days with rose-tinted glasses!) It was a lot stronger then and also cost a lot more.  Today, E costs as little as £1 or £2 a pill and contains anything but MDMA. Perhaps, because of these changes, the party drug of choice isn't even ecstasy anymore, many people have switched to ketamin, taking it in combination with other 'uppers'. 

Maybe before newspaper editors print stories they should consider both sides of the argument and give an non-biased view - Fat chance!!

The scandal of skunk

It seems the UK has gone skunk crazy. There's been a massive media campaign which has hyped up fears of skunk to the point that we're scared of our own shadows. Gordon Brown is planning to re-classify cannabis up to a class B drug. This decision totally ignores the recommendations to be published today by the government's scientific experts, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, that cannabis should remain class C. Why have an Advisory Council of experts if your not going to heed their advice?

In a statement last week Gordon Brown described Cannabis as a gateway drug and that reclassification was needed to "send a message to young people that it was unacceptable".

One of the reasons that the Advisory Council found that Cannabis should remain at class C, was that raising the classification, and therefore the penalties, would not stop people from using it. In fact it places Cannabis even more firmly in the hands of criminal gangs. If Gordon Brown really wanted to make sure it couldn't be used as a gateway drug by youngsters, he should have decriminalised it totally. By having it tightly controlled and on sale in only licensed premises, he would have taken it from the organised crime gangs, and therefore also taken the Cannabis smokers out of that world too, it couldn't possibly 'lead on' to something else then. Another plus is that the strength of the Cannabis being sold could also be controlled, with different types from weak to stronger being offered for sale, as in Amsterdam, giving the smoker the choice and information to go along with it.

No Gordon, I'm afraid your petty excuses won't wash. So what's the real reason that this reclassification is going ahead?