AMAZING EDITORIAL LANCET

>>the following is the editorial of last Lancet

>>I will put it up drugtext but could nor resist sending it to you all

>>

>>regards,

>>mario lap

>>

>>THE LANCET

>>Volume 346, Number 8985, November 11 1995

>>

>>Editorial

>>

>>Deglamorising cannabis

>>

>>The smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health. Yet

this widely used substance is illegal just about everywhere. There have been

numerous calls over the years for the legalisation, or at least

decriminalisation, of soft drugs, among which cannabis remains the most

popular with all social groups. In this highly contentious area, the Dutch

attitude has been often mentioned as the voice of sanity. In the

Netherlands, customers of coffee shops can buy up to 30 g of cannabis for

about 10 pounds ($15) although the drug is technically illegal. The shops

are not allowed to advertise, or to sell cannabis to individuals aged under

16 years.

>>

>>Prominent among those currently calling for legislative reform - and going

further by making constructive proposals - are police chiefs and city

medical officers, people who know only too well that the existing policies

in most countries are ineffective and unworkable. Meanwhile, politicians

have largely remained silent, seemingly afraid of offending powerful

segments of the electorate or merely of being perceived as weak in the face

of rising crime figures. When the occasional politician raises her head

above the parapet - as the British opposition MP Clare Short did recently in

calling for a fresh debate on decriminalisation of cannabis - the response

is tediously predictable: widespread condemnation from political colleagues

and overwhelming support from those who have to cope with the end result of

political inertia.

>>

>>In the case of Ms Short, not only was she speedily reprimanded by the

party leader, but also party officials claimed that their non-legalisation

stance was entirely logical since legalisation of cannabis would "increase

the supply, reduce the price, and increase the usage". According to a Home

Office report earlier this year, the number of people taking cannabis has

doubled in a decade - without any help from "liberal" measures. Perhaps the

politicians' real fear was that freedom to use soft drugs would

automatically progress to increased use of substances such as cocaine and

heroin. If so, they must have overlooked the recent Dutch government review

which pointed out that decriminalisation of possession of soft drugs has not

led to a rise in the use of hard drugs.

>>

>>If the Dutch approach is so successful, why are changes afoot in The Hague

to tighten up that country's drug policy.? First Amsterdam's mayor proposed

closing down half the city's coffee shops that sell cannabis, and in doing

so he rejected a report by his health department in favour of legalisation

of soft drugs. Then the Dutch government, which had made an election promise

to legalise cannabis, last month issued a discussion paper which mirrored

the Amsterdam plan. If, as expected, the Dutch parliament agrees the latest

proposals, half the country's 4000 cannabis-selling coffee shops will close

and the amount that can be sold to an individual will be cut to 5 g. Since

the government's own review provides no ammunition for such a change in

policy, the real reason behind the new measures must lie elsewhere. One need

look no further than the Netherlands' neighbours and co-signatories of the

Schengen agreement, which introduced a border-free zone between the

Netherlands, France, Germany, Spain, Luxembourg, and Belgium. When France,

in particular, threatened to end the agreement, claiming that the

Netherlands was the major supplier of Europe's drugs, some action had to be

taken and the coffee shops became the scapegoat.

>>

>>Leaving politics aside, where is the harm in decriminalising cannabis.?

There is none to the health of the consumers, and the criminal fraternity

who depend for their succour on prohibition would hate it. But

decriminalisation of possession does not go far enough in our view. That has

to be accompanied by controls on source, distribution, and advertising, much

as happens with tobacco. A system, in fact, remarkably close to the existing

one in Dutch coffee shops.

>>

>>Cannabis has become a political football, and one that governments

continually duck. Like footballs, however, it bounces back. Sooner or later

politicians will have to stop running scared and address the evidence:

cannabis per se is not a hazard to society but driving it further

underground may well be.

>>

>>The Lancet

>

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Subject: Lancet editorial forward

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