Government Ignores Drug Claims

The Government last week rejected claims by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) to downgrade ecstasy to a Class B drug. The ACMD’s review builds on evidence from a 2007 investigation by The Academy of Medical Scientists which claimed that ‘the current system is not fit for purpose’. It reviewed 20 different drugs, including 5 legal ones. Shockingly, ecstasy placed only 18th most dangerous, whilst alcohol placed 5th and tobacco 9th. The study measured the drugs on 9 different areas, one of which being strength of dependency to the drug. This is one of the main reasons for ecstasy’s low placing in the study’s harm rating, as there has never been a proven case of anyone being addicted to MDMA (ecstasy’s main ingredient). The study also rated the drugs on how harmful use of them is to society, and as dependency causes most drug related crime, such as robbery and prostitution, ecstasy rated low on this count too. There is also debate on how many deaths are caused by ecstasy, some estimates giving the figure as low as 10 a year, whilst others claim it is closer to 60. However, one person a week dies from alcohol poisoning, so even the higher of these estimates still rates alcohol as dangerous as ecstasy. Despite this, a Home Office spokesman said that the Government had no plans to downgrade ecstasy from a Class A drug, which it has been since 1977, basing much of this decision on there being no ‘safe dose’ of the drug. Taking just one ecstasy tablet could kill you, whilst one glass of wine is rather more unlikely to produce the same effect. However, a large proportion of deaths or side-effects caused from taking ecstasy are due to the drug being cut with different substances, such as ketamine or amphetamine. People often do not know what they are buying, which is an unfortunate side-effect of MDMA being illegal, meaning that there is no external body to check standards or purity. Approximately 70% of ecstasy believed to be in the UK market at any one time is in tablet form, the remaining 30% mainly consisting of powdered ecstasy, or crystal ecstasy as it is more widely known. This form of the drug has caused even more health risks as it is much stronger than in tablet form, leading to more overdoses. There have also been reports of several incidents of drug users accidentally taking ecstasy whilst believing it to be cocaine, not only making it more dangerous as they are mixing drugs, but also due to MDMA being almost 10 times more powerful than cocaine. Ultimately the dangers of taking any illegal substances are very real, but it is important that the punishment truly reflects the implications of selling or taking the drug in question.

Esther Dudley