Huddersfield Daily Examiner (Huddersfield, England), Nov 3, 2009
Byline: Denis Kilcommons
THE poor old Government can”t get anything right.
Ministers are struggling to keep their heads above water over the scandal of expenses, the popularity of the Party, the recession and an election that is approaching at the speed of a runaway train, and what happens? Their chief drugs advisor, Professor David Nutt, is sacked because they don’t like his advice, and his scientific colleagues begin resigning in protest..
“It’s unusual political times, I suppose, elections and all that. It’s disappointing,” he said. “But politics is politics and science is science and there’s a bit of a tension between them sometimes.” And what exactly did the chairman of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs say to attract the ire of the Home Secretary? He claimed that ecstasy, cannabis and LSD were less dangerous than alcohol and tobacco. He did not say they were not dangerous – he said they were less dangerous. His top 10 of lethal drugs was: heroin, cocaine, barbiturates, methadone, alcohol, Ketamine, Valium, amphetamine, tobacco, buprenorphine. Marijuana came 11th, LSD was 14 and ecstasy was down at 18.
He made his statement after the Government decision to reclassify cannabis against his council’s advice.
The misuse of drugs is an emotive issue. I know because I have a lot of friends who are addicts. They cannot go a day, or even an hour, without lighting up a cigarette and inhaling tobacco.
And I confess, I’m one of the millions who may have signs of rheumatoid arthritis a pint of beer, even two