Posted by After five members of the government’s Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs walked out in protest at the sacking of Bristol academic Professor David Nutt, the Home Secretary Alan Johnson has now agreed to concessions demanded by the remaining ACMD members.
Mr Johnson has said he will not pre-judge decisions on drug classification ahead of the committee issuing advice. But will he? For Bristol24-7 reader Andy Wills, in this information-overloaded world, we need policy based on information we can trust…
Alan Johnson:Will concessions for scientists be enough to provide sensible policy?
“We live in an ‘information overload’ – a world in which we are bombarded with choice, rhetoric, and information of all kinds, from all sides. It seems that now, even the decision to buy a pint of milk from the shop leaves you dribbling in a corner from sheer choice.
This relentless abundance of choice has also nestled its chaotic head in the drugs market.
There are more drugs on the market nowadays (legal and illegal) then there ever were before.
Notwithstanding the real dangers posed by many of the legal and illegal drugs out on the streets, a real problem comes from all the conflicting information the public receives about them.
On the one hand the government has a classification system for a reason: for our safety and protection. But what are the public supposed to think when the head of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) gets fired for producing results that showed alcohol and tobacco were deemed more dangerous than LSD and cannabis?
This isn’t the first time Prof Nutt has raised eyebrows in the Home Office. In 1999, former home secretary Jacqui Smith was shocked at his remarks that ecstasy was less dangerous than horse riding, and in 2004, ignored the ACMD’s advice not to reclassify cannabis to class B, causing the professor to accuse Smith of “distorting” and “devaluing” scientific research.
His most recent report however was the last straw, ministers accused him of trivialising the dangers of drugs and stepping over the political line.
This has spurred five member of the ACMD to leave in protest. A move that clearly sends out a message – the political agenda has overruled science and the evidence is being ignored.
If we are ever going to take the government seriously on their ‘classification system’ the evidence has to concur. With all the money in taxation alone in alcohol and tobacco, is it any wonder there is the perception that the government is protecting its little investment?
The professor feels that the public should be well informed, that “We have to accept young people like to experiment, and what we should be doing is to protect them… We have to tell them the truth, so that they use us as their preferred source of information”.
In the information-loaded modern world, it’s difficult to know what is truth and what isn’t, especially when the distinct sound of back scratching can be heard behind closed doors. Can the public really afford to wait another generation listening to the muffled screams of independent scientists, before we have a sensible policy on drugs?
Further reading
