“I thought I was gonna die,” she said in her explosive new biography written by Helia Phoenix.

outrageous dresser Lady Gaga has come out in her biography LADY GAGA: Just Dance about her cocaine addiction saying she “believed it would have killed her”.The outrageous pop diva – who stole the show at last week’s Grammys performing with Sir Elton John- told how she would lock herself in her room snorting “bags and bags” of the drug to get inspiration for her music. And now the 23-year-old whose real name Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta – claims she was eventually saved… “by a dead auntie whose ghost lives inside her.”“I wanted to be the artists I loved, like Mick Jagger and Andy Warhol – and I thought the only way to do it was to live the lifestyle. But then I realised my father’s sister Joanne, who’d died at 19, had instilled her spirit in me. She was a painter and a poet – and I had a spiritual vision I had to finish her business,” she said.In the book that will only be in stores from February 18, Gaga reveals how she stripped on stage during a song as an unknown to get a bored audience to notice her. And served meatballs to a lover in only Knickers and Stilettos to turn him on.
Costing about R164 per copy, the singer revealed in the book how she dropped out of her New York performing arts school at 20 and descended into a nightmare world.“My cocaine soundtrack was always the Cure. I would lock myself in my room and listen to Never Enough on repeat while I did bags and bags of cocaine. It was about being an artist. I wasn’t a lazy addict. I would make demo tapes and send them around. At the time I didn’t think there was anything wrong with me, until my friends said, ‘Are you doing this alone?’ Um, yes. Me and my mirror.”

While the detox process is painful and difficult for all the patients, most are making it through without complications, until Mindy McCready suffers an intense seizure and is taken to the hospital. Heidi Fleiss exposes to the group that she spends most of her time alone with birds in the desert, while Dennis shares that he hosts parties in his home for hundreds of people every night. Tom Sizemore finally arrives for treatment, but before Dr. Drew can fully admit him, Tom leaves against Dr. Drew's wishes.
zSHARE video - celebrity.rehab.with.dr.drew.Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew – Season 3 Episode 3 – Dealing with the Past

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Dr. Drew's patients are just beginning the treatment process, and as many of them are life-long drug users, the physical effects of detox are severe for many of the addicts. Mike Starr is having the most severe withdrawal, which is causing him to become confused and act out towards the staff. Then later in process group, the patients reveal their lowest points, and we see one of the many consequences of Dennis Rodman's alcohol abuse.




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Geri Halliwell's lover was arrested for possessing cocaine after a night out at top London club.Henry Beckwith, 31, the heir to a £400m fortune, was held by officers near Raffles nightclub in Chelsea, a haven for rich socialites.Rumoured to be set to marry the Spice Girls singer, Beckwith was not with her at the time of his early-morning arrest.Unconcerned: Geri Halliwell and Henry Beckwith at The Ivy following his arrest and caution for cocaine possessionA Metropolitan Police spokesman said: 'We can confirm a 31-year-old man was found with a quantity of white powder in Paulton Square where he was arrested on suspicion of possessing a class A drug.'He was later cautioned after being taken in handcuffs to Chelsea Police Station just before 2am on Sunday morning.A source at members-only club Raffles told the Sunday Mirror: 'Beckwith is a regular and was here partying in the early hours of Sunday morning.
'He was seen going outside and around the corner, where he was searched by the police.'Raffles has a strict policy on drugs - anyone found with them in the club will be banned.'I'm sure Geri wasn't too delighted he had been arrested for drugs.'Devoted mum: Geri Halliwell and daughter Bluebell wearing matching coats at Heathrow Airport Halliwell has dated Beckwith for a year and sparked rumours of a possible engagement when she was seen visiting her parish church in Hampstead, North London.The 37-year-old mother of Bluebell, three, took her friend Kenny Goss to meet the vicar of St-John-at-Hampstead.
Goss, the partner of George Michael, was seen dining with the couple and David Walliams at The Ivy restaurant in london last night.

It's hardly a secret that taking cocaine can change the way you feel and the way you behave. Now, a study published in the Jan. 8 issue of Science shows how it also alters the way the genes in your brain operate. Understanding this process could eventually lead to new treatments for the 1.4 million Americans with cocaine problems, and millions more around the world. The study, which was conducted on mice, is part of a hot new area of research called epigenetics, which explores how experiences and environmental exposures affect genes. "This is a major step in understanding the development of cocaine addiction and a first step toward generating ideas for how we might use epigenetic regulation to modulate the development of addiction," says Peter Kalivas, professor of neuroscience at the Medical University of South Carolina, who was not associated with the study. Though we think about our genes mostly in terms of the traits we pass on to our children, they are actually very active in our lives every day, regulating how various cells in our bodies behave. In the brain this can be especially powerful. Any significant experience triggers changes in brain genes that produce proteins — those necessary to help memories form, for example. But, says the study's lead author, Ian Maze, a doctoral student at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, "when you give an animal a single dose of cocaine, you start to have genes aberrantly turn on and off in a strange pattern that we are still trying to figure out." Maze's research focused on a particular protein called G9a that is associated with cocaine-related changes in the nucleus accumbens, a brain region essential for the experience of desire, pleasure and drive. The role of the protein appears to be to shut down genes that shouldn't be on. One-time use of cocaine increases levels of G9a. But repeated use works the other way, suppressing the protein and reducing its overall control of gene activation. Without enough G9a, those overactive genes cause brain cells to generate more dendritic spines, which are the parts of cells that make connections to other cells.
Increases in the number of these spines can reflect learning. But in the case of addiction, that may involve learning to connect a place or a person with the desire for more drugs. Maze showed that even after a week of abstinence, mice given a new dose of cocaine still had elevated levels of gene activation in the nucleus accumbens, meaning G9a levels were still low. It is not known how long these changes can last. Maze also showed that when he intervened and raised G9a levels, the mice were less attracted to cocaine.
It's a big leap from a mouse study to a human study, of course — and an even bigger leap to consider developing a G9a-based treatment for addiction. The protein regulates so many genes that such a drug would almost certainly have unwanted and potentially deadly side effects. But a better understanding of the G9a pathways could lead to the development of safer, more specific drugs. And studying the genes that control G9a itself could also help screen people at risk for cocaine addiction: those with naturally lower levels of the protein would be the ones to watch. Still, there's a lot to be learned even from further mouse studies — particularly if the work involves younger mice, unlike the adults used in Maze's research.

"We know that the greatest vulnerability [to addiction] occurs when adolescents are exposed," says Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, which funded the study. "Would you see the same results in adolescent [mice]? And what happens during fetal exposure?"

New treatments are definitely needed for cocaine addiction: there are helpful medications for addiction to heroin and similar drugs, but so far, none are particularly useful against stimulants like cocaine and methamphetamine. And with federal reports now showing that more than two-thirds of all cocaine in the country is cut with a veterinary deworming drug called levamisole, which can cause potentially fatal immune-system problems, the risks from cocaine are greater — and the search for new answers more urgent than ever.

It was a medical mystery. In the summer of 2008, a man and woman, both in their 20s and both cocaine users, were separately admitted to a Canadian hospital with unremitting fevers, flulike symptoms and dangerously low white blood cell counts. Their symptoms were consistent with a life-threatening immune-system disorder called agranulocytosis, which kills 7% to 10% of patients and is rare except in chemotherapy patients and those taking certain antipsychotic medications.Neither of the Canadian patients fit that bill, but they did have one thing in common: illegal drug use, says Dr. Nancy Zhu, who treated the patients during her hematology fellowship at the University of Alberta Hospital in Edmonton. "We were theorizing that maybe it was something in the cocaine," she says. The medical literature didn't contain any studies linking agranulocytosis with cocaine. However, earlier that same year, in April, a New Mexico lab had identified a small number of unexplained cases of the disorder, also in people who had snorted, injected or smoked cocaine. Later, in 2009, a few cocaine addicts in San Francisco — crack smokers, mostly — began displaying even stranger symptoms, like dead, darkened skin. "It looked like people were getting burns all over their body," says Dr. Jonathan Graf, a rheumatologist at the University of California, San Francisco. "[Their skin was] black, as if you had taken a cigarette butt to it. In some people, it was all over, on their legs and bellies."By this time, back in Canada, a toxicologist at Alberta Hospital had noticed an unusual chemical in the urine of the two cocaine-using patients: levamisole. Zhu contacted him and they put the puzzle together. Further research revealed that levamisole, a drug that was once used to treat colon cancer but is now reserved for veterinary use as a medication to get rid of worms, can cause agranulocytosis in humans. The "burns" seen in Californian patients, who were also suffering from agranulocytosis, were the result of skin infections related to patients' compromised immunity. There have now been several dozen cases of cocaine-related agranulocytosis reported in North America — and one known death. "For some reason, this drug called levamisole keeps popping up," Zhu says. Where is it coming from? According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, levamisole has become increasingly popular as a "cut" or diluting agent in cocaine and possibly some heroin. It is now found in 70% of all cocaine seized in the United States, up from 30% in 2008. Unlike most cuts — usually inert or relatively harmless substances like the B-vitamin inositol, which are added by lower-level dealers looking to stretch supplies — levamisole appears to be added to cocaine from the outset, in the countries of origin. The substance has been found in various concentrations in cocaine analyzed in various countries around the world, from Switzerland to Australia. And urine tests of cocaine users attending a drug clinic in San Francisco General Hospital in 2009 — one floor above Graf's office — found that 90% of samples were positive for levamisole; similar tests in Seattle revealed that 80% of cocaine users there had levamisole in their systems too."If it's showing up in all those different places, that's a prima facie indicator that it's happening at the highest levels of production," says Craig Reinarman, a sociologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz who has long studied cocaine. But since cocaine is illegal, there's no easy way to remove levamisole from the supply chain. Law enforcement could instead target large purchasers, possibly putting pressure on dealers to switch to other cuts.

Levamisole is cheap, widely available and seems to have the right look, taste and melting point to go unnoticed by cocaine users, which may alone account for the popularity of the cut.

"Ease of availability seems likely to be important," says Reinarman. "Let's remember that producer countries are widely agrarian." Levamisole is used on farms and its cost per gram is minimal.An understanding of how levamisole affects the body, however, may better explain its explosive popularity. A 1998 paper found that levamisole relieved symptoms of heroin withdrawal in rats and also raised levels of various brain chemicals related to drug highs. "It may increase dopamine and by so doing may enhance cocaine effects," speculates Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Research conducted by Eldo Kuzhikandathil, assistant professor of pharmacology at University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, suggests that levamisole may indirectly increase the number of D1 dopamine receptors in the brain by affecting gene expression there. "Cocaine increases D1 expression," he says, "And this would probably accentuate that," which could enhance both highs and craving.Levamisole also affects acetylcholine receptors throughout the body, which can boost heart rate — and studies of cocaine users show that they associate jumps in heart rate with getting high, spurring good feelings even before the drug hits the brain. A cut that accelerates heart rate might make them think that they're getting the real thing. In the brain, levamisole may affect the same acetylcholine receptors activated by nicotine, another addictive drug that raises dopamine levels — and another possible clue to levamisole's lure.
But despite the wide use of levamisole, cases of agranulocytosis are relatively uncommon. According to government surveys, nearly two million Americans have taken cocaine at least once in the last month. "Why aren't 90% of cocaine users [in San Francisco] getting sick?" says Graf, who says he sees about one case every few weeks, mostly in women. He suspects that men are less likely to be affected because they are less vulnerable to autoimmune disorders than women, but says that the truth is, no one really knows why certain users become ill. Zhu and Graf urge users who are suffering from fever or unexplained infections to seek medical help immediately — the sooner agranulocytosis is treated, the greater the odds of survival.



To both physicians, the biggest mystery may be the power of cocaine addiction itself. Some of Graf's patients waited months before seeking help, as patches of painful, blackened skin continued to grow — and some continued to use cocaine despite learning that it caused their immune problems and that they could require plastic surgery to avoid permanent disfigurement. Zhu has treated several patients with life-threatening infections, some needing breathing tubes and intensive care. "It's quite sad, every time they use [cocaine], it happens. They wind up in the hospital for several weeks and almost die. But as soon as they go home and back into that environment, the cycle begins again."

Karl Barnes, 19, had been given a glowing progress report from Castington young offenders’ institution, Teesside Crown Court was told.Barnes, from South Bank, successfully completed a drug and alcohol abuse programme, and he was assessed as “polite” and “respectful”.He was arrested after he was spotted trying the door handles of five houses in Park Avenue, Teesville, after midnight on December 18. Barnes told police later: “I was off my head.”He had many previous convictions for dishonesty, and been sentenced to detention and training for robbery, the court heard yesterday.Richard Herrmann, defending, said: “He now realises it is his time to mature. He had taken drink and drugs and he has no recollection of where he was or what he was doing.”Barnes of Upper Princess Street, pleaded guilty to burglary with intent to steal on December 18.Judge Peter Bowers told him: “It seems to me that from the letter I have got from the prison officer that you are getting a lot of help in Castington."It seems to me that when you are not in custody your compliance with any probation and intervention is intermittent.” Barnes was sentenced to 12 months detention in a young offenders’ institution.The judge added: “You will be released after half of that, and perhaps you can sort your life out.”

Cleveland Police made the discovery while searching a garage in Hartlepool last Friday.

Inside they found a massive stash of amphetamines with a street value of £180,000.
A search warrant was executed at a house on the town’s Irvine Road at 7.45am where officers found thousands of pounds in cash and an amount of suspected Class B drugs.Further inquiries led them to search a garage block near Innes Road in the town where they made the huge find.
Sergeant John Hemsworth, of Hartlepool District Drugs Unit, said: “This was a substantial recovery of what we believe to be amphetamines which would have been destined for the streets of Hartlepool and further afield.“Residents can be assured that we will always act on any information from the public about the use and supply of drugs.”A 40-year-old man and a 39-year-old woman were arrested and have since been bailed while inquiries continue.

investigation by the BBC has revealed the true danger of the evil Buckfast tonic wine. Between 2006 and 2009 Buckfast was mentioned in over 5,000 crime reports in the Strathclyde region. Good lord! How shocking.The shock is not the utter amount of chaos Buckfast is portrayed as causing, rather it's the BBC's terrible analysis of these statistics.Let's start at the beginning. The BBC news story says:
the drink was mentioned in 5,638 crime reports in Strathclyde from 2006-2009, equating to three a day on average.One in 10 of those offences were violent and the bottle was used as a weapon 114 times in that period.Well the three-reports-a-day and one-in-ten-being-violent this works out as a violent incident involving Buckfast once every three or four days. And considering the large amount of violence that occurs in Glasgow on a day-to-day basis anyway this is almost totally negligible. It is also only slightly more often than a murder in Glasgow, one of which occurs roughly every 5 days. The second factoid tells us that in the three years the statistics are taken from a Buckfast bottle was used as a weapon less than 40 times a year. And according to previous BBC report there were 40 murders using knives in 2007. Murders, not just stabbings or assaults. Clearly the issue of knife crime is much more of a pressing issue than Buckfast-bottle crime - although of course there will be some overlap between the two.
The BBC also talk about the old urban legend that the amount of caffeine in Buckfast is what causes drinkers to go crazy. This is despite there being no scientific evidence for this. If this were the case then vodka-Red Bull mixes would bring about the same reaction surely?
Laying the blame for violent crime at the door of Buckfast is stupid and short-sighted. Buckfast may be involved in over 5000 crime reports, but how many involve beer, or whiskey, or wine, or sloe gin. How does this correspond to their respective share of the drinks market? Come to think of it, how many crime reports involve alcohol, and how what percentage is this of all crime? Just loudly stating "over 5,000 crime reports" is meaningless as you haven't given it any context.
And why is Buckfast to blame? I know plenty of people who like to drink it at parties, and none of them have managed to get in a fight or crack people's skulls open with the bottle. Most of them just end up passing out. The problem surely isn't that Buckfast makes people violent, more that violent people drink Buckfast. Stop them doing that and you'd probably see a rise in violence associated with some other drink.
Honestly, this is such pointless alarmist crap. Scotland collectively has a drinking problem. This is what needs to be sorted out. Not dangerously pointing fingers at some trumped-up bad guy, or demanding legislation to stop people from exercising their rights of consumer choice.

The amount of the benefit that it takes to be a heroin addict overcome their addiction - or even ask for help - greatly. A decision made out when you are under the influence of no use because I do not feel much or think wearing almost nothing, and when starting the drug and withdrawal symptoms begin, it is a very difficult decision to make. They know that to stop the pain if you got another, and the pain is unbearable. That's where a good heroin> Detox comes in, and that is why you have someone in detoxification from heroin immediately if you get the chance. After deducting committed, the person is probably going through physical and mental torture. What would your decision if you are vomiting, trembling, very excited, nervous and depressed and go through what is probably the worst and most crippling muscle and bone pain have you ever heard or feel ever in your life - would be moreRid of the pain of heroin, or if you choose to stand for several days or longer? The majority of drug addicts - 95 percent of them - choose the drug. Only 5 percent of the test, heroin and other opiates cold turkey success. If the person is in the throes of heroin withdrawal, even in the early stages, there will be one more chance to convince you that they know they help, if you let them get into a drug rehabilitation center that they obtain areHeroin detoxification in a way that effectively relieve the symptoms that now goes into being. Yes, including everything they want from drugs. But during the withdrawal, the drug seems to only your salvation. A good detoxification program that allows you to alleviate heroin withdrawal symptoms, their hopes that they can actually be free of drugs. If you or someone you want to end heroin addiction, you should know that it is so unbearably painfulThe experience might be expected. Best of all, when used with the recall, if you have a good program of detoxification from heroin, backups and all other food you need help, you will feel physically and emotionally stronger than you have felt in a long time and you are in a better position to address the problems behind the addiction. Then you can stay free of drugs. The fear of withdrawal is one of the main reasons for heroin addicts do not get help - have a little taste of whoWithdrawal, he was gone too long without a hit, or who have often seen or heard about the withdrawal of other experiences. Knowing that they are in a program of detoxification from heroin that these complaints are often all they need to accept, however, to obtain relief to get help. And a good drug detox is the beginning of the end of heroin addiction.

The secret to being a rocket scientist has been revealed—cocaine! NASA is currently investigating the origins of a bag containing cocaine residue that was discovered in the hanger of the space shuttle Discovery in Cape Canaveral. "There are no obvious indications of anyone acting oddly or under the influence," a NASA spokesman said. Really, astronauts always stay awake for 50 hours at a time.

Reggae singer Buju Banton was arrested Thursday in Miami. The singer, whose real name is Mark Anthony Myrie, faces possible life imprisonment if convicted on charges of drug conspiracy charges.Allegedly, Buju Banton was conspiring to distribute 5 kilos of the drug cocaine.This isn't the first time Buju Banton has been in the headlines. His song "Boom Boom Bye" has hateful and violent lyrics aimed toward creating violence against the LGBT community. In response, many of his concerts were cancelled.
He also made headlines when his album Rasta Got Soul was actually nominated for a Grammy Award.

Clubbers and addicts are increasingly turning away from ecstasy and heroin to ketamine, a dangerous horse tranquilliser that has been linked to 23 deaths.According to a leading drug charity worker, addicts on Teesside are turning to the drug because it’s purer than heroin, while research by Newcastle-based Drugscope found there was an increased use amongst clubbers of the narcotic.Tina Williams, of Parents and Addicts Against Narcotics in the Community said: “Ketamine is the new ‘stuff’ and we have a lot of people using. It’s definitely on the increase.
“It’s a horse sedative and it has a similar effect to heroin. Addicts have cottoned onto this as heroin is now so diluted in the region they can’t even get a hit off it.“It’s readily available and now addicts have more options rather than just heroin and crack.
“Because it’s a class C drug people don’t think that it can be dangerous.”
Known as Special K, Vitamin K or simply K, the drug is developing a strong following in dance club circuits despite being made illegal three years ago.It is usually snorted or swallowed but according to research by Drugscope, more and more people are choosing to inject it.At low levels users feel euphoric, experience waves of energy and even a condition called synaesthesia where users’ senses merge into one another.
But at higher levels the drug can cause paralysis, hallucinations and a disassociation that is close to an out of body experience. It is also a known date rape drug as it has no taste and is odourless.

90,000 people will die over the next 10 years from drink unless cheap alcohol is banned, a new report has claimed. Skip related content
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Drink deaths 'treble in 25 years'
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The charity Alcohol Concern issued the sobering warning after its latest research found drink-related deaths have trebled in Britain over the last 25 years from 3,054 in 1984 to 8,999 in 2008.

To combat the problem, it proposes banning cheap booze by forcing suppliers to charge at least 50p per unit.

Doing so would substantially reduce hospital admissions, crime and absence from work, the report claims.

Research by the University of the West of England used by Alcohol Concern found there would be 90,800 deaths linked to drink by 2019 if current consumption continues.

The lead author, Professor Martin Plant, said: "The UK has been experiencing an epidemic of alcohol-related health and social problems that is remarkable by international standards."

The findings coincide with a new drive to reduce binge drinking in Greater Manchester, where the problem is particularly acute.

Councils in the area are actively considering a minimum price for booze sold in its pubs, clubs and supermarkets.

Police there have just begun a clampdown on licensees and bar staff who illegally serve people who are already drunk.

But although binge drinking is usually blamed on the younger generations, Alcohol Concern has revealed the steepest rise in alcohol-related deaths is among the 55 to 74-year-olds.

Peter Ivory still finds it hard to believe how close he came to being in that category.

The 62-year-old former store manager from Sunderland always thought of himself as a social drinker.

A few years ago his holiday was cut dramatically short when he was flown back from Spain with excruciating stomach pain. He collapsed and eventually had to have a liver transplant.

He said: "I suppose I should consider myself lucky that I'm still alive.

"But actually - if you lose your liver you lose your life."

Peter now struggles with simple undemanding tasks and suffers from constant fatigue, nerve pain, high blood pressure and depression.

He believes the "British epidemic" is leading thousands of young people down the same road.

"People have to listen to the stories of people like me," he said.

"We now have young people who are wrecking their lives. This is not about me telling others not to drink. It's about asking them to hear me and to plead with them not to end up like me."

Alcohol-related deaths have almost trebled over the last 25 years, according to new research. Skip related content
Related photos / videosCalls for minimum alcohol price limits Play video Darts legend Andy Fordham says alcohol nearly ... Play video Calls for minimum alcohol price limits Play video Drink deaths 'have trebled in 25 years' A study carried out by the University of the West of England for Alcohol Concern suggests that 90,800 people will die from drinking too much in the next ten years if current consumption levels continue.
The charity said alcohol-related deaths went from 3,054 in 1984 to 8,999 in 2008.Alcohol Concern Chief Executive Don Shenker said: "Whilst there has been a small reduction in consumption and mortality over the last two years, the overall trend is a rise in consumption and a trebling of deaths since 1984."This rise runs in parallel with the growing affordability of alcohol. Without policies which more effectively target the cheap price of alcohol we will not get to grips with what has become one of the country's biggest public health problems."Brigid Simmonds, Chief Executive of the British Beer and Pub Association, said: "Alcohol policies designed to reduce drinking in the whole population are misguided. Controls on the total amount we drink will not work. What we need is a new debate about effective policy measures that are clearly targeted at the minority who misuse alcohol."

England is one of the heaviest drinking countries in Europe, with more than a third of men and a fifth of women exceeding Government limits, Alcohol Concern said.

In 2006 to 2007, the estimated cost of alcohol abuse to the NHS was £2.7 billion, and the Government said last year that the total expense of harm caused by drink was around £17.7 to £25.1 billion per year.

The trends are revealed in a previously unpublished analysis by the NHS's National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse (NTA) of data on addicts in England who receive treatment for their drug habit. The agency believes that the statistics "herald a generational shift in patterns of drug dependence in England".young adults with a drug problem are using heroin and crack – the two substances most likely to cause addiction, increase crime and pose serious health risks – but the number of under-25s seeking treatment for dependency on cocaine is rising significantly, official figures show.NTA data passed to the Guardian shows that the number of 18- to 24-year-olds newly presenting for treatment for heroin or crack fell by 22% from 12,320 in 2005-06 to 9,632 in 2007-08, even though drug treatment was more readily available than ever. However, the number of over-35s seeking treatment for the first time rose by 11%, from 20,465 in 2005-06 to 22,770 two years later.Over the same period, the number of young adults seeking help from a drug treatment service for cocaine problems rose from 1,591 to 2,692 – a rise of 69%.Overall, the number of young adults seeking help for misuse of heroin, crack or powder cocaine fell from about 14,000 in 2005 to about 12,000 in 2008 – evidence of another encouraging trend.
The NTA's annual report, to be published on Thursday, is expected to confirm that both the shift away from heroin and crack and the growing problem of cocaine addiction in under-25s continued in 2008-09.Paul Hayes, the NTA's chief executive, said: "It is reassuring that younger people seem to be turning away from heroin and crack. The quite significant reduction in the numbers of people seeking help [for those drugs] probably illustrates an actual fall in problematic use because help has never been more available."Fewer people using heroin is good news as heroin is the most dangerous of all the drugs that people use. Given it involves a significant risk of overdose, HIV and hepatitis C, and is associated with acquisitive crime, I'm convinced that individuals, communities and wider society will benefit, especially the poorest communities, which heroin affects most."However, the increase in cocaine dependency among the same age group was "very significant" and worrying, added Hayes. "There's been an increase in cocaine use generally for a few years, especially in the younger age groups, and that's now being reflected in significant additional numbers being treated for cocaine. That's worrying because cocaine dependency can be associated with health damage, crime and problems in individuals, although it's not as problematic as heroin because it's not injected."Heroin became a major problem in Britain in the 1980s amid growing unemployment. Better economic circumstances in recent years may help to explain its declining popularity among younger drug users, said Hayes. In addition, he said, "people understand now what using hard drugs like heroin and crack leads to, whereas in the 1980s people weren't so aware of its consequences. It's lost a lot of its glamour. It's associated with losers rather than risk-takers. Heroin and crack are seen as dirty, nasty, horrible drugs, whereas cocaine can be seen by some people as an adjunct to the party lifestyle, in the same way that alcohol can be."The NTA's research tallies with growing evidence from frontline drug workers that younger users are increasingly using cocaine as part of a combination of illicit substances. "The emerging problems facing drug projects who run young people's services aren't [clients using] heroin and crack but strong alcohol, strong cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy – a different basket of drugs to the older generation," said Harry Shapiro, of Drugscope, which represents about 800 local drug agencies in the UK. Experts refer to this pattern of drug use as "the ACCE profile".
In all, 530 young adults aged 18-25 were referred to the Mosaic drug and alcohol service in Stockport in 2007-08. Of those, 193 were seeking treatment for cannabis, 175 for alcohol, 115 for cocaine and only 27 for heroin. A survey of men aged 19-25 in the town found that the drugs that most had tried were cannabis (64%), powder cocaine (33%) and ecstasy (32%). Cocaine's greater availability and ensuing cheaper price is believed to explain its popularity."It's good that fewer young people appear to be using heroin," said Shapiro. "But the fact that young people who have drug problems now increasingly have problems of cocaine, cannabis and alcohol addiction means that we still have a serious problem here. There's also a challenge in this for drug treatment services, which are very much geared up to the needs of heroin users, and their ability to deal with a new generation of problem drug users who don't fit the traditional profile."Roger Howard, chief executive of the UK Drug Policy Commission thinktank, said: "There is a generational shift under way, with older, more chronic heroin users entrenched in heroin and a younger adult group who are much more into multi-drug use. It's worrying that we're seeing more people with multiple drug use because they are much more difficult to treat."The fact that cocaine users are usually better-off and less isolated from their families than heroin users may make them less likely to ask the UK's network of drug services for help, he added.

Transnational Crimes and Narcotics Division is reporting that 53 people were arrested last month for ingesting and attempting to export drugs at the country’s two international airports. The number includes men and women. In addition the division says two persons died. One of the two died after ingesting marijuana while the other died after ingesting cocaine pellets. The Transnational Crimes and Narcotics division says a number of the people caught before September are now hospitalized after ingesting drug pellets which broke.

Immunization with an experimental anti-cocaine vaccine resulted in a substantial reduction in cocaine use in 38 percent of vaccinated patients in a clinical trial supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), a component of the National Institutes of Health. The study, published in the October issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry, is the first successful, placebo-controlled demonstration of a vaccine against an illicit drug of abuse."The results of this study represent a promising step toward an effective medical treatment for cocaine addiction," said NIDA Director Dr. Nora Volkow. "Provided that larger follow-up studies confirm its safety and efficacy, this vaccine would offer a valuable new approach to treating cocaine addiction, for which no FDA-approved medication is currently available."Like vaccines against infectious diseases such as measles and influenza, the anti-cocaine vaccine stimulates the immune system to produce antibodies. Unlike antibodies against infectious diseases, which destroy or deactivate the disease-causing agents, anti-cocaine antibodies attach themselves to cocaine molecules in the blood, preventing them from passing through the blood-brain barrier. By preventing the drug's entry into the brain, the vaccine inhibits or blocks the cocaine-induced euphoria.This study included 115 patients from a methadone maintenance program who were randomly assigned to receive the anti-cocaine vaccine or a placebo (inactive) vaccine. Participants were recruited from a methadone maintenance program because their retention rates are substantially better than programs focused primarily on treatment for cocaine abuse. Participants in both groups received five vaccinations over a 12-week period and were followed for an additional 12 weeks. All participants also took part in weekly relapse-prevention therapy sessions with a trained substance abuse counselor, had their blood tested for antibodies to cocaine, and had their urine tested three times a week for the presence of opioids and cocaine.Participants differed in the levels of antibodies generated in response to vaccination. Thirty-eight percent attained blood levels of anti-cocaine antibodies thought to be sufficient to block cocaine's euphoric effects. During weeks 9 to 16 (when antibody levels peaked), these participants had significantly more cocaine-free urines than those who received the placebo or those with active vaccine but low levels of anti-cocaine antibodies. Participants with the highest antibody levels had the greatest reductions in cocaine use. No serious adverse effects were associated with vaccine treatment."Fifty-three percent of participants in the high-antibody group were abstinent from cocaine more than half the time during weeks 8 to 20, compared with only 23 percent of participants with lower levels of antibodies," said Thomas Kosten, M.D., of Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, the study's principal investigator.
"In this study immunization did not achieve complete abstinence from cocaine use," added Dr. Kosten. "Previous research has shown, however, that a reduction in use is associated with a significant improvement in cocaine abusers' social functioning and thus is therapeutically meaningful."Dr. Kosten led the study in collaboration with colleagues from Yale University School of Medicine, the Connecticut Veterans Administration (VA) Healthcare System, Baylor College of Medicine, and the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center.

The government is considering whether legal, injectable heroin might be one way to tackle the effects of drug abuse, but where exactly do the authorities get their heroin from?After a trial reported success in tackling use of street drugs and crime, Justice Secretary Jack Straw has suggested that prescribing heroin on the NHS may be the only way to deal with some users. Most people probably think of opium poppies coming from Taliban-controlled fields in Afghanistan or from the Far East's Golden Triangle, but it is perfectly possible to produce opium in the UK.
Diamorphine for the addict treatment trial is produced in the UK
The UK has one diamorphine producerPoppies are grown in Hampshire, Wiltshire and elsewhere in the south of EnglandIndeed, all of the diamorphine - equivalent to heroin - used in the UK's addict treatment trial is produced in the country. Opiates firm Macfarlan Smith, a subsidiary of Johnson Matthey, is the country's sole diamorphine producer.
It holds contracts with farmers in the south of England - including Hampshire and Wiltshire - to grow crops of poppies, says Ian Godwin, communications director for Johnson Matthey. The firm takes the harvest and processes the poppies into what is called "active pharmaceutical ingredient" (API). This API is then passed on to a UK pharmaceuticals firm to be turned into doses. The processing of opium poppies is done under government licence in "extremely secure" conditions.

The world's pharmaceutical firms get their poppies from everywhere from Spain to India, but the biggest producer is Tasmania in Australia. In Tasmania, a thousand farmers grow poppies across about 13,000 acres and it is one of the island's major exports.

The growing of poppies there can only be done under licence and there are strict controls on access to the field. Possession of opium poppies is a crime. Heroin is not just for addicts but also for other medical uses
The heroin prescription trial in the UK, which is being run at the National Addiction Centre, initially used diamorphine imported specially from Switzerland and distinct from the NHS's own stockpile. It moved to using British diamorphine when that became a cheap enough option. The cost of a year's diamorphine treatment for an addict is about £15,000, although this includes administering and supervising the injections. There have been similar trials involving pharmaceutical heroin in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany and Canada. But the UK also has another use for diamorphine. It continues to be used in palliative care, to relieve pain in terminally ill people. A recent problem with supply led to many doctors using other opioids, says Dr Bill Noble, president of the Association for Palliative Medicine. "It is virtually the same as using morphine. The only difference is that diamorphine is much more soluble than morphine, which means you can have much lower volume injections."A regular part of the BBC News Magazine, Who, What, Why? aims to answer some of the questions behind the headlines
It is also used as part of the treatment for some patients with acute heart failure.
Diamorphine does not tend to be used in other countries for palliative purposes simply because it is illegal, says Dr Noble.

Health officials have stepped up their efforts to call attention to health risks caused by cocaine laced with levamisole, a veterinary anti-parasitic drug. The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) has issued a nationwide health alert to medical professionals, substance abuse treatment centers and other public health authorities.
In humans, levamisole can cause agranulocytosis, a serious, sometimes fatal blood disorder. Ingesting cocaine mixed with levamisole can seriously reduce a person's white blood cells, suppressing immune function and the body's ability to fight off even minor infections, according to SAMHSA. People who use crack or powdered cocaine laced with levamisole can experience overwhelming, rapidly-developing, life-threatening infections, the agency said in a news release.Other serious side effects can also occur. If you use cocaine watch out for:
High fever, chills, or weakness.
Swollen glands,Painful sores (mouth, anal)
Infections that won't go away or gets worse very fast
Skin infections, abscesses
Thrush (white coating of the mouth, tongue, or throat)
Pneumonia (fever, cough, shortness of breath)
"SAMHSA and other public health authorities are working together to inform everyone of this serious potential public health risk and what measures are being taken to address it," said SAMHSA Acting Administrator Eric Broderick.
The number of reported cases of agranulocytosis due to tainted cocaine use is expected to increase as information about levamisole is disseminated through the medical community. Thus far, 20 known cases and two deaths have been confirmed.According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Columbia cocaine producers are lacing their product with the medication to give it an extra kick.

British and South African authorities have made a record heroin seizure following on operation at London's Heathrow Airport and raids in both countries, officials said.Immigration officials discovered some of the drugs hidden in souvenirs from South Africa at Heathrow, sparking an investigation that netted 360 kilograms of heroin in total, the UK Border Agency said.Seven people have been arrested in both countries over the total seizure, worth $US41 million, the agency said.Thousands of kilograms of cannabis were also discovered, the agency said."This latest detection of heroin at Heathrow, believed to be our biggest ever, highlights our success in preventing class A drugs entering the UK," said Philip Astle, the UK Border Agency's Heathrow director.About 165 kilograms were discovered at Heathrow, a record seizure for the world's busiest airport, on September 9 in the consignment of souvenirs.After an investigation, police seized another 80 kilograms and arrested two people in Kent, south-east England, charging one with conspiracy to import drugs and possession, the agency said.Acting on information from Britain, South African police arrested five people, including three British nationals, and seized 115 kilograms of heroin and 6,500 kilograms of cannabis in a warehouse outside Durban. "These seizures are a great example of what can happen when partners work together, said Britain's Serious Organised Crime Agency deputy director Andy Sellers."Both ends of this international chain have been attacked, and a significant amount of heroin and cannabis has been kept off the UK's streets." Staff at Heathrow airport uncovered drugs when they stopped a consignment of souvenirs from South Africa earlier this month.On closer inspection, they found 165kg of heroin hidden in the goods.
Officials from the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) were alerted and a house was raided in Maidstone, Kent, where more heroin was discovered.
There have also been searches in Durban, South Africa, where further drug finds were made.A total of 360kg of heroin has now been recovered, as well as 6,500kg of herbal cannabis resin.The estimated street value of the drugs is £25m.Seven people have been arrested, including five in South Africa and two in Britain.Sky's home affairs correspondent Mark White said: "This is being hailed as a great success for the UK Border Agency which, in conjunction with SOCA, managed to thwart what was a huge shipment of the class A drug heroin into the UK."The agency claims to have managed to intercept an international drug smuggling ring, he added.The discovery of the heroin was made a week ago but details of the bust were kept secret while operations were still active.

Brighton,known as the "drugs death capital" of the UK, with per capita mortality rates higher than any other city. The city has held this unwanted title for six out of the last eight years – despite costly intervention schemes and dedicated work by police and health services to reduce drug supply and demand.With this – and an estimated 2,300 injecting heroin users – in mind, it's hard to fault Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust for agreeing to support a trial centre, and when I heard about the project, I jumped at the chance to join the nursing team.So, I've been giving people heroin for the last two years. People have often asked me if I think the treatment works. I do. I've seen it first-hand. But until yesterday, you would have had to take my word for it. Now scientifically rigorous evidence is out there.Our trial participants were all long-term heroin addicts who had failed to benefit from existing treatment options. They continued to inject heroin daily, or on most days, and their drug use was considered intractable. In my experience, many had little hope for their own recovery.The results show that, of those receiving injectable heroin, a substantial majority had either dramatically reduced their illicit heroin use or ceased altogether after six months' treatment, although marked improvements were seen after just six weeks. The average weekly spend on illicit heroin, per client, dropped from £300 to £50.The cost of injectable heroin treatment is estimated at £15,000 per person annually, compared to regular methadone treatment at about £3,000. It looks expensive, but if you add in the crime bill, this group of people actually costs less to treat with heroin than with oral methadone. Prison, which has limited therapeutic benefits, costs £44,000 a year. Not treating this group of people at all also comes with a massive bill. Estimates of an annual drug expenditure of £15,000 to £30,000 per addict are not uncommon. If this sum is to be raised through acquisitive crime, as is often the case, goods worth perhaps three times that value need to be stolen.Trial participants showed gains in physical and mental health, social functioning and, I can report anecdotally, self-respect. Almost all of the clients at my clinic have chosen to stop injecting twice a day and only come once in the morning. Two are living drug free. And nobody died.

Mobile phones and SIM cards have been found in cells at Bristol Prison an average of three times a month, Government figures have revealed.
Officers discovered 18 handsets and 14 SIM cards had been smuggled into the Category B prison in Horfield over the last financial year.
That translates to one in 19 inmates having the potential to make uncontrolled contact with the outside world.
But as the figures only relate to phones and cards found by the authorities, the true scale of the problem could be far greater.
The Liberal Democrats used the records, which were released in Parliament, to claim that prisons were out of control.

On-duty NHS specialists are set to join a hi-tech government crackdown on the smuggling of class A drugs into the UK by scrutinising live x-rays

Scheme in which heroin is given to addicts in supervised clinics has led to big reductions in the use of street drugs and crime, the BBC has learned. More than 100 users took part in the pilot – part funded by the government – in London, Brighton and Darlington. They either injected heroin or received the drug’s substitute methadone. Those given heroin responded best and an independent panel which monitored the scheme over six months are advising ministers to set up further trials. About three-quarters of those given heroin were said to have "substantially" reduced their use of street drugs. Research suggests that between half and two-thirds of all crime in the UK is drug-related. The Home Office says on its website that about three-quarters of crack and heroin users claim they commit crime to feed their habits.
PILOT SCHEME FINDINGS
Three-quarters reduced use of street heroin
Offences down from 1,731 in 30 days to 547 in six months
Spending on drugs down from £300 to £50 a week
Figures for group given heroin Professor John Strang, who led the project, said the results were "very positive" because the scheme had helped cut crime and avoid "expensive" prison sentences. Professor Strang, who is based at the National Addiction Centre, part of King’s Health Partners, said the individuals on the programme were among those who had been the hardest to treat. "It’s as if each of them is an oil tanker heading for disaster and so the purpose of this trial is to see: ‘Can you turn them around Is it possible to avert disaster’ "And the surprising finding – which is good for the individuals and good for society as well – is that you can," he said. The Randomised Injecting Opioid Treatment Trial (RIOTT) programme – which is funded by a number of agencies, including the Department of Health – began in 2005. It involved 127 chronic heroin addicts for whom conventional types of treatment had failed. Many of the addicts were also using other substances, including crack cocaine. During the trials, a third of addicts were given the heroin substitute methadone orally and another third injected methadone under supervision. The remainder, observed by nurses, injected themselves with diamorphine – unadulterated heroin – imported from Switzerland.
National roll-out,Those on the programme were also given psychological support and help with their housing and social needs. The results showed that addicts in all three groups cut the amount of heroin they obtained illicitly from street dealers. According to researchers, more than half of the heroin injecting group were said to be "largely abstinent" and one-in-five did not use street heroin at all. Before they began the programme, the addicts in the heroin injecting group were spending more than £300 a week on street drugs. After six months, this had reduced to an average of £50 a week."It used to be about chasing the buzz, but when you go on the programme you just want to feel comfortable"John, RIOTT participant
There was also a big drop in the number of offences addicts admitted committing to obtain money to feed their habit. In the previous month before the scheme started, addicts in the heroin injecting group reported carrying out 1,731 crimes. After six months, this had fallen to 547 offences – a reduction of more than two-thirds. One of the heroin addicts on the programme, a 34-year-old man called John, had been addicted for eight years when the trials began. He fed his habit by dealing. "My life was just a shambles… waking up, chasing money, chasing drugs," he said.
But John said the scheme had transformed his life "100 per cent" and he now had a part-time job. "It used to be about chasing the buzz, but when you go on the programme you just want to feel comfortable," he said.
"I’ve started reducing my dose gradually, so that maybe in a few months time I’ll be able to come off it altogether, drug free totally." In its drug strategy, published last year, the government said it would "roll out" the prescription of injectible heroin, subject to the findings of the pilot scheme. The National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse (NTA), which administers drug treatment in England, said the results were "encouraging". The NTA said an independent expert group, set up to advise the government, had concluded that there was enough "positive evidence of the benefits" of the programme to merit further pilots. The NTA is understood to be keen to evaluate the financial implications of the scheme. At £15,000 per user per year, supervised heroin injecting is three times more expensive than other treatments.

PREGNANT Filipinas are the favorite “carriers” of drug syndicates bringing illegal drugs to China and Malaysia, according to former labor undersecretary Susan Ople, head of the Blas Ople Policy Center. Ople’s group is helping overseas Filipino workers victimized by drug syndicates. She said these groups use pregnant women as drug mules because they are least to be eyed as couriers and they get lighter penalties if they get arrested

controversial scheme to give addicts heroin at supervised clinics has led to a reduction in crime. More than a hundred addicts took part in the scheme in London, Brighton and Darlington which was part funded by the government. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8254872.stm
Here's a report by Danny Shaw, the BBC home affairs correspondent:
Is this the right approach to tackling the problem of drugs and crime? If you've been a drug user or the victim of drug related crime are you in favour of this approach? Are you happy with any measures that reduce crime or do you feel that this is an example of society going soft on drug addicts?
In 1994 the Swiss embarked on their Heroin Assisted Treatment project. This resulted in a significant improvement of health (both mentally and physically) for the majority of the over 1200 participants. In addition, a massive reduction in criminal behavior was observed.The HAT outpatient centers are spread over the following Swiss cities : Basel, Bern, Biel, Brugg, Burgdorf, Chur, Geneva, Horgen, Lucerne, Olten, Reinach, Schaffhausen, Solothurn, St. Gallen, Thun, Winterthur, Wetzikon, Zug, Zürich and in two prisons Oberschöngrün (canton Solthurn) and Realtà
The Swiss Federal office for public health reports that :
In many cases, patients’ physical and mental health has improved, their housing situation has become considerably more stable, and they have gradually managed to find employment. Numerous participants have managed to reduce their debts. In most cases, contacts with addicts and the drug scene have decreased. Consumption of non-prescribed substances declined significantly in the course of treatment.
Dramatic changes have been seen in the situation regarding crime. While the proportion of patients who obtained their income from illegal or borderline activities at the time of enrollment was 70%, the figure after 18 months of HAT was only 10%.Each year, between 180 and 200 patients discontinue HAT. Of these patients, 35-45% are transferred to methadone maintenance, and 23-27% to abstinence-based treatment.The average costs per patient-day at outpatient treatment centers in 1998 came to CHF 51. The overall economic benefit - based on savings in criminal investigations and prison terms and on improvements in health - was calculated to be CHF 96. After deduction of costs, the net benefit is CHF 45 per patient-day.

British tourist was found dead in his room, the police are now trying to find out who sold the heroin to him and
his partner at Calangute. Nigel Smith, 62, was found dead in his room early Sunday morning. His live-in partner, a French national, Anne Francoise, informed the police that on Saturday night they had both gone to sleep in their rented room in Calangute after consuming heroin. The lady told the police that they had purchased the drug from someone in Calangute, but added that she will not be able identify the seller. "Nigel must have woken up in the night maybe to go to the bathroom, lost his balance and fallen on the floor. His head must have hit the ground and he must have collapsed. She said that when she woke up at about 2 am she found him dead," police sources added.

Gerda Lienga, 42, was arrested at Belfast International Airport last June after getting off a flight from Paris. She was taken to a local hospital where 110 small packages containing more than a kilo of cocaine were recovered. She was jailed on Friday at Ballymena Crown Court and will be deported on completion of her sentence.
Officers from HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC), who arrested Lienga, said the purity of the cocaine was above normal and "could pose higher risks to the courier and users".
Senior HMRC officer John Whiting said: "Criminals dealing in drugs with high purity levels are thinking solely of increased profits, to further fund their illegal activity. "They show utter disregard for the damage drugs do to individuals and communities."

Juan Jose Larez, 40, of The Cloisters, Leyland, was jailed for his part in trying to smuggle six kilos of the class A drug into the UK through Manchester Airport. He was identified as ringleader of a five-strong gang behind the attempted plot. The jail terms follow a major investigation by HM Revenue and Customs which brought the gang down. His Honour Judge Henshall explained in his summing up at Manchester Court that he believed Larez - who also has an address in Venuzuela and is believed to spend most of his time there - was the main mover behind the plot.Officers from the UKBA originally detected the drugs on September 18 last year when a party of five people arrived on a flight from Paris to Venezuela.Officers searched baggage and discovered the class A drugs, which have a street value of £500,000, concealed within suitcases. Nick Shaw, of criminal investigations HMRC, said: "Working with our colleagues in the UKBA and prosecutors from RCPO, we will take every action to detect, seize and bring those smuggling drugs into the country before the courts.

Afghanistan produced 6000 tons of opium in 2006, 8200 tons in 2007 and 7700 tons in 2008. On average, the world demand of opium-based narcotics, including heroin, is only half of this production. Where is the rest of opium going? Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UNODC is convinced that is the only explanation. In a recent bulletin he issues an urgent order: 'Find the missing opium.' "As a priority, intelligence services need to examine who holds this surplus, where it may go, and for what purpose" he says. "We know little about these stockpiles of drugs, besides that they are not in the hands of farmers."

Dublin boy (17) has been received a seven year sentence after being found in possession of heroin worth €150,000.The boy pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to possession of the drugs for sale or supply at his guardian’s home on December 9th, 2007. He had 19 previous convictions for a range of offences including public order and assault.Garda John Griffin told the court the drugs were found in the teenager’s bedroom which he shared with his uncle and he admitted to gardai that they belonged to him.Garda Griffin agreed with defence counsel Giollaíosa Ó Lideadha that the boy’s life “would have been at risk” had he identified the source of the drugs.Mr Ó Lideadha told the court his client was under his grandaunt’s care after his father had to be hospitalised following an accident and his mother had “her own difficulties to deal with”.

He said that the teenager was a drug user at the time and that he appeared he had “been under instruction” in this offence and was to receive a small amount of money for his involvement.

Judge Patrick McCartan said that heroin was “a very damaging drug that caused havoc in society and provided a lot of money to people, unlike this boy, but higher up than him”. He accepted that he was involved to pay off a “small debt” and he was under “the control of sinister people”. Judge McCartan said that the teenager was living in “a chaotic situation” and was likely to get in further trouble “with devastating consequences for him”.
“He is someone in need of structure, support and discipline” before he added that he was going to suspend the last four years of the sentence “to give him some hope for the future”.

Home Office officials have admitted that the street price of class A drugs, cocaine and heroin, has fallen by almost 50% over the past decade.Widely recognized as the most dangerous illegal drugs, heroin and cocaine are currently cheaper than they have ever been.

Home Office has admitted that the street price of both cocaine and heroin has fallen by nearly half in the last ten years, making the most dangerous illegal drugs cheaper than they have ever been.Based on reports from police forces, the Home Office said that cocaine is now being sold for as little as £20 a gram in some parts of the country.The most common price for the drug is £40 per gram. Home Office figures for 1998 show the average price was £77.A gram of heroin can now be bought for as little as £25, with the average price somewhere between £40 and £50 per gram. In 1998, the average was £74.The Home Office figures are based on data collected from police forces and the Serious Organised Crime Agency.According to DrugScope, a charity that provides research and advice on drugs policy, gram of cocaine can make between 10 and 20 lines for snorting, depending on its strength.That means a line of cocaine can cost as little as £1, with an average price per line of between £2 and £4.The average price of a pint of lager is around £2.75, although some pub chains have reacted to the credit crunch by cutting the price of a pint as low as 99p. A glass of wine typically costs £3.50.The figures were uncovered by the Tories, who said they proved that Labour had failed to stem the flow of Class A drugs into the UK.
James Brokenshire, the Conservative shadow home affairs minister, called the figures "startling."He said: "These startling figures show the reality of drug use in Britain. Price falls of this nature indicate that the supply of hard drugs into this country has jumped. It's a serious indictment of Labour's failure to combat drug crime and stem the flow of drugs onto our streets."Less cocaine is being intercepted on Britain's borders. The Home Office figures last year showed that the total weight of cocaine seized actually fell by 15 per cent a year, and it has halved in five years.In 2003, 6,813 kg of cocaine was seized by police and customs officers in England and Wales. In 2006/07, it was 3,191kg. The last time cocaine seizures were smaller was 1999.The Home Office suggested that drug prices may be falling partly because fewer people are buying drugs.A spokesperson said: "A reduction in price may be associated with increased competition or reduced demand, not just increased availability.
"The British Crime Survey data shows that among 16-59 year olds Class A drug use in the past year declined from 3.4% in 2006/07 to 3.0% in 2007/08.
"In relation to cocaine the average purity at street level has declined continuously for a number of years, from 51% in 2003 to 34% in 2007."

Latvian Diana Sosnovska, 25, and Freddy Quintero-Mendoza, a 49-year-old Venezuelan cook, were both sentenced to four years behind bars. The pair, who appeared to be travelling together, were arrested at Stansted Airport on June 16 2008 after arriving on a flight from Milan.Maddy Ratnett from HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) said: "This case demonstrates the great lengths that smugglers will go to in an attempt to conceal illegal drugs. The sentences handed down today to these couriers should send out a clear message that you will pay the price."Sosnovska, who lives in north London, was stopped and searched by officers from the UK Border Agency. Three drug packages were discovered in her briefs and a further three were concealed in her bra, including one in the padding. In total officers recovered 638 grams of crack cocaine with a street value of £46,000.Mendoza from Brentwood was also stopped by officers but refused to be searched until a warrant was obtained. The case was passed over to officers from HMRC for further investigation. Later when Mendoza was searched, a package was found strapped to his groin area, kept tightly in place with cling film. Both Sosnovska and Mendoza were charged with smuggling offences and remanded in custody.X-rays taken later revealed that Mendoza had a number of packages in his stomach that he had swallowed. He eventually passed 17 small pellets each one approximately 3cm long and under went surgery to remove the last two pellets. In total approximately 498 grams of cocaine was recovered from Mendoza with a street value of £50,000.Ms Ratnett said: "We always pursue those who mastermind and finance this type of illegal trade and would urge anyone with information about drug smuggling to call the Customs' Hotline on 0800 59 5000." Both were charged with being knowingly concerned in the importation of cocaine and both pleaded guilty to the offences.

Heroin was discovered when police raided Alexander Skelly's house in Craigmore Street on 2 April last year. Officers also discovered £1,350 in cash in the bedroom and a further £180 after searching Skelly, 42. Sentence on Skelly, who has previous convictions for drugs offences, was deferred until next month. The High Court in Edinburgh heard that when police arrived at Skelly's house they asked if there were drugs in the property. He replied "just that smack there," indicating a bedside cabinet. Officers found a bag containing 37g of the drug on top of the cabinet, but then discovered another 17 wraps of brown powder each weighing about 27g within drawers. The prosecutor said a total of 507g of heroin were recovered in the raid, which police experts estimated had a wholesale value of £18,300 but could be worth £50,700 when broken into street deals.

"Local authorities need to pay attention to the emergence of synthetic drugs, they are the drug of the future," said Vitor Cesar Carvalho dos Santos, head of the narcotics department in the Rio police department. "This is a health problem."
Brazilian police said Thursday that it arrested 55 people in nationwide operations to crack two crime rings that were smuggling ecstasy, LSD and other synthetic drugs into the country from Europe.The police nabbed the suspects in eight Brazilian states, 47 of them in Rio de Janeiro, said Chief Enrico Zambrotti, the Federal Police coordinator of Operation Knockout, one of the two police operations.
Most of those arrested were people in their twenties from middle-class families with no prior criminal histories, Zambrotti said.

The trafficking rings earned several hundred thousand dollars a month in a scheme that involved using drug "mules" to smuggle cocaine to Europe and then return to Brazil with synthetic drugs, the police said.

Investigators said that Henrique Dornelles Forni, 25, was among those arrested and that he was a principal distributor of synthetic drugs in Rio, the newspaper O Globo reported. He was captured while trying to escape from the penthouse where he lived in the Lagoa area of Rio, the paper said.

The operations began 10 months ago, investigators have arrested some two dozen drug mules that were suspected of carrying the drugs in from Europe and seized more than 100,000 ecstasy pills, the police said.

The chronology of cannabis

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2737 BC: Cannabis referred to as a "superior" herb in the world's first medical text, or pharmacopoeia, Shen Nung's Pen Ts'ao, in China
1500 BC : Cannabis-smoking Scythians sweep through Europe and Asia, settling and inventing the scythe.
1400 BC : Cultural and religious use of ganga or cannabis, and charas or hashish (resin) recorded used by Hindus in India.
c.600 BC : Zend-Avesta, Indian scripture, speaks of hemp's intoxicating resin.
c.500 BC : Gautama Buddha said to have survived by eating hempseed. Cannabis used in Germany (Hochdorf Hallstatt D wagon burial site). First botanical drawings of cannabis in Constantinopolitaus.
450 BC : Herodotus records Scythians and Thracians as consuming cannabis and making fine linens of hemp.
300 BC : Carthage and Rome struggle for political and commercial power over hemp and spice trade routes in the Mediterranean.
100 BC : Chinese make paper from hemp and mulberry.
70 BC : Roman Emperor Nero's surgeon, Dioscorides, praises cannabis for making the stoutest cords and for its medicinal properties.
c.30 AD : Jesus teaches: Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man (Matthew 15:11). The Gospels refer to the New Wine and declare that it is best when the clusters are ripe.
100 AD : Roman surgeon Dioscorides names the plant cannabis sativa and describes various medicinal uses. Pliny reported of industrial uses and wrote a manual on farming hemp.
400 AD : Cannabis cultivated for the first time in the UK at Old Buckenham Mere
500 AD : First botanical drawing of hemp in Constantinopolitanus
600 AD : Germans, Franks, Vikings etc all use hemp fibre.
800 AD : Mohammed allows cannabis but forbids the use of alcohol.
1000 AD : The English word "hempe" first listed in a dictionary. Moslems produce hashish medicine and social use.
1150 AD : Moslems use hemp to start Europe's first paper mill. Most of the paper is made from hemp for the next 750 years, including Bibles.
1379 AD : Emir Soudon Sheikhouni of Joneima prohibits cannabis consumption amongst the poor, destroys the crops, and punishes offenders by pulling out their teeth.
1484 AD : Inquisitor Pope Innocent VIII outlaws hashish.
1494 AD : Hemp paper industry starts in England.
1545 AD : Hemp agriculture arrives in China.
1554 AD : The Spanish grow hemp in Peru.
1563 AD : English Queen Elizabeth I decrees that land owners with more than 60 acres must grow hemp or be fined 5 pounds.
1564 AD : King Philip of Spain orders hemp grown throughout his empire from modern Arhentina to Oregon.
1600 AD : Dutch achieve the "Golden Age" through hemp commerce. Explorers find "wilde hempe" in North America.
1606 AD : The British take cannabis to Canada for maritime uses.
1611 AD : The British start growing cannabis in Virginia.
1619 AD : Virginia colony makes hemp cultivation mandatory, followed by most other colonies. Europe pays hemp bounties.
1621 AD : Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy claims cannabis is a treatment for depression.
1631 AD : Hemp used as money throughout American colonies.
1632 AD : The Pilgrims take cannabis to New England.
1637 AD : The General Court at Hartford, Connecticut, orders that all families plant one teaspoon of cannabis seeds.
1639 AD : Massachusetts Courts follow Hartford.
1753 AD : Cannabis Sativa classified by Linneaus.
1763 AD : New English Dictionary says cannabis root applied to skin eases inflammation.
1776 AD : Declaration of Independence drafted on hemp paper.
1791 AD : President Washington sets duties on hemp to encourage domestic industry. "Make the most of the Indian Hemp Seed" ........President George Washington. (Library of USA Congress 1794 vol. 33 p.270). President Jefferson calls hemp a necessity and urges farmers to grow hemp instead of tobacco.
1800 AD : Cotton gins make cheaper fibre than hemp. Napoleon prohibits his men in Egypt from using cannabis, but to little effect.
1835 AD : The Club de Hashichines is founded.
1839 AD : Homeopathy journal 'American Provers' Union' publishes first report on effects of cannabis.
1840 AD : "Prohibition... goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control mans' appetite through legislation and makes a crime out of things that are not even crimes... A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our Government was founded"...........Abraham Lincoln (December 1840)
1841 AD : Dr. W.B.O'Shaughnessy, "On the Preparation of the Indian Hemp or Ganja" introduces cannabis to western science.
1845 AD : Psychologist and inventor of modern psychopharmacology and psychotomimetric drug treatment, Jacques-Joseph Moreau de Tours documents physical and mental benefits of cannabis.
1850 AD : Petrochemical age begins. Toxic sulphite and chlorine processes make paper from trees: steamships replace (hemp) sails; tropical fibres introduced.. USA census records 8327 hemp plantations of over 2000 acres each.
1854 AD : Bayard Taylor essay Visions of Hashish.
1857 AD : Fitz Hugh Ludlow publishes The Hasheesh Eater;
1857 AD : Smith Brothers of Edinburgh market cannabis indica extracts.
1860 AD : First governmental commission study of cannabis and hashish conducted by Ohio State Medical Society. It catalogues the conditions for which cannabis is beneficial: neuralgia, nervous rheumatism, mania, whooping cough, asthma, chronic bronchitis, muscular spasms, epilepsy, infantile convulsions, palsy, uterine haemorrhage, dysmenorrhea, hysteria, alcohol withdrawal and loss of appetite.
1868 AD : The Emir of Egypt makes the possession of cannabis a capital offence.
1869 AD : Tales of Hashish by A.C. Kimmens
1870 AD : Cannabis listed in US Pharmacopoeia as a medicine.
1870 AD : South Africa worried about cannabis use among Indian workers, passes a law forbidding the smoking, use or possession of hemp by Indians.
1876 AD : Hashish served at American Centennial Exposition.
1877 AD : The Sultan of Turkey makes cannabis illegal, to little effect.
1894 AD : British Indian Hemp Drugs Commission studies social use of cannabis and comes out firmly against its prohibition.
1895 AD : First known use of the name "marijuana" for smoking, by Pancho Villa's supporters in Sonora, Mexico.
1909 AD : Shanghai Conference: first international meeting on drugs is held to discuss opium. The USA passes an act to prohibit the buying or selling of opium for non-medicinal purposes.
1910 AD : African-American "reefer" use reported in Jazz Clubs in New Orleans, said to be influencing white people. Mexicans smoking marijuana in Texas. South Africa prohibits cannabis.
1911 AD : Hindus reported to be using ganja in San Francisco.
1911 AD : South Africa bans cannabis.
1912 AD : "Essay on Hasheesh" by Victor Rolson. Possibilities of putting controls on cannabis use is first raised.
1912 AD : Hague Conference; second international meeting on drugs. 46 nations discuss opium, morphine, cocaine, heroin and cannabis. The Hague Convention for the Suppression of Opium and Other Drugs, was drawn up, requiring parties to confine to medical and legitimate purposes the manufacture, sale and use of opium, heroin, morphine and cocaine; Cannabis was not included. (From Mandeson, D. From Mr Sin to Mr Big, A history of Australian Drug Laws, Oxford University Press Melbourne 1995)
1912 AD : First suggestions that cannabis should be banned internationally, at the First Opium Conference.
1915 AD : Utah State, then California and Texas outlaw cannabis. Cocaine banned in the USA.
1916 AD : USDA Bulletin 404 calls for a new program of expansion of hemp to replace uses of timber by industry.
1919 AD : Texas outlaws cannabis. Alcohol is prohibited throughout the USA. Cannabis is still legal in most States.
1920 AD : DuPont experiments with petrochemicals. Gang war takes over the alcohol industry, homicides increase drastically.
1923 AD : South African delegate at League of Nations calls for international controls on cannabis, claiming that it makes mine workers less active. Britain insists on further research.
1923 AD : Louisiana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington outlaw cannabis.
1924 AD : At the Second International Opiates conference Egyptian delegate claims serious problems are associated with hashish use and calls for immediate international controls. Sub-committee listens to Egypt and Turkey. Cannabis declared a narcotic. Cannabis Ruderalis identified by Lamarck.
1927 AD : New York outlaws cannabis.
1928 AD : UK Dangerous Drugs Act (September 28th) 1925 becomes law and makes cannabis illegal.
1929 AD : The Panama Canal Zone Report concludes that there is no evidence that cannabis use is habit-forming or deleterious, recommending no action be taken against cannabis use or sale.
1929 AD : South West states make cannabis illegal as part of a move to oust Mexican immigrants.
1930 AD : Henry Ford makes his motor cars out of hemp with hemp paint and hemp fuel. New machines invented to break hemp, process the fibre and convert the pulp or hurds into paper, plastics etc. 1200 hash bars in New York City. Racist fears of Mexicans, Asians and African-Americans lead the cry for cannabis to be outlawed.
1930's AD New mechanised hemp harvesting methods invented
1930 AD : Louis Armstrong arrested in Los Angeles for possession of cannabis.
1931 AD : Federal Bureau of Narcotics formed with Anslinger at the head. By now 29 US states have banned non-prescription cannabis
1934 AD : Anslinger refers to "ginger-haired ******s" in FBI official circulars.
1936 AD : South Western states call for FBI to ban cannabis.
1937 AD : Marijuana Tax Act forbids hemp farming. The Act was based on the Machine Gun Transfer Act which made it illegal to pass on machine guns without a government stamp - there being no such stamps available. By applying this strategy to marijuana, Anslinger was able to effectively ban hemp without contravening constitutional rights.
1937 AD : DuPont files patents for nylon, plastics and a new bleaching process for paper. Anslinger testifies to congress that Marijuana is the most violence-causing drug known to man. The objections of the American Medical Association are ignored. The Marijuana Transfer Tax Bill (14th April) introduced to US House, Ways and Means Committee, passed December, prohibits industrial and medical uses and calls flowering tops a narcotic. Violations attract 200 dollar fines. Birdseed, rope and cordage are exempted from tax.
1937 AD : DuPont patents plastics, seizing the opportunity created by cannabis hemp prohibition
1939 AD : LaGuardia Report started
1941 AD : Cannabis dropped from USA Pharmacopoeia
1941 AD : Henry Ford's car is made from and runs on cannabis.
1943 AD : Hemp for Victory program urges farmers to grow hemp to help war effort.
1943 AD : US Military Surgeon magazine declares that smoking cannabis is no more harmful than smoking tobacco.
1944 AD : New York Academy of Medicine reports marijuana use does not cause violent behaviour, provoke insanity, lead to addiction or promote opiate usage. Anslinger describes the authors as dangerous and strange.
1944 AD : New York Mayor's La Guardia Report "The Marijuana problem in the City of New York" concludes that smoking marijuana does not lead to addiction in the medical sense of the word, that juvenile delinquency is not associated with marijuana smoking and that the publicity concerning the catastrophic effects of marijuana smoking in New York is unfounded.
1944 AD : Anslinger threatens doctors who carry out cannabis research with imprisonment.
1945 AD : USA 'Newsweek' reports over 100,000 Americans use cannabis.
1948 AD : Anslinger now says cannabis users are peaceful and that cannabis could be used during a communist invasion, to weaken American will to fight.
1948 AD : United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948 AD : Hollywood star Robert Mitchum arrested for cannabis.
1951 AD : UN Bulletin of Narcotic Drugs states over 200 million cannabis users in the world.
1952 AD : First UK cannabis arrest at Number 11 Club, Soho, London.
1955 AD : Hemp farming outlawed again.
1960 AD : Hippies, Vietnam Veterans, pop fans adopt cannabis.
1961 AD : UN Treaty 406 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs seeks to outlaw cannabis use and cannabis cultivation worldwide and eradicate cannabis smoking within 30 years (by 1991). USA representative is Anslinger.
1962 AD : President Kennedy sacks Anslinger. Kennedy using cannabis as a pain relief.
1963 AD : Kennedy assassinated.
1964 AD : Thelin Brothers open first US 'Head Shop'.
1964 AD : THC, tetrahydracannabinol, first isolated
1966 AD : Donovan becomes first UK celebrity to be busted for cannabis.
1967 AD : SOMA Times Petition in the UK urges legalisation of cannabis. The Beatles sign it. 3,000 people hold a 'smoke-in' in Hyde Park.. Keith Richards and Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones are arrested and imprisoned for cannabis. This prompts a Times editorial 'Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?'. The convictions are quashed on appeal.. In the UK 2,393 persons arrested for cannabis offences.. In the USA over 3,000 joints mailed to addresses at random by Abbie Hoffman and the Yippies.
1968 AD : John Lennon arrested for cannabis possession.
1968 AD : 1 November : UK Government Wootton Report recommends cannabis possession should not be an offence. "Having reviewed all the material available to us we find ourselves in agreement with the conclusion reached by the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission appointed by the Government of India (1893-94) and the New York Mayor's Committee (1944 - LaGuardia) that the long-term consumption of cannabis in moderate doses has no harmful effects."
1968 AD : Campaign to stop US soldiers in Vietnam from taking cannabis - they switch to heroin.
1969 AD : James Callaghan, UK Labour Prime Minister, rejects the findings of the Wootton Report.
1969 AD : George Harrison arrested for cannabis.
1970 AD : Social use of cannabis receives widespread acceptance despite illegality; policy of decriminalisation sweeps across USA and Britain.
1970 AD : LeDain Report (Canada) recommended that serious consideration be given to the legalisation of personal possession of marijuana. It finds that cannabis use increases self-confidence, feelings of creativity and sensual awareness, facilitates concentration and self-acceptance, reduces tension, hostility and aggression and may produce psychological but not physical dependence. The report recommends that possession laws be repealed
1970 AD : R. Keith Stroup founds NORML 'National Organisation for Reform of Marijuana Laws', in UDSA.
1970 AD : USA Marijuana Transfer Tax declared unconstitutional.
1971 AD : British Misuse of Drugs Act classifies cannabis as a Class B drug with stiff sentencing. This bans the medical use of cannabis, ignoring the Wootton Report.
1971 AD : UN Convention on Psychotopic Substances
1972 AD : US President Richard Nixon says 'I am against legalising marijuana'.
1972 AD : Baan Commission presents report to Dutch Minister of Health and suggests that cannabis trade below a quarter of a kilo ought to be considered as a misdemeanour only.
1973 AD : Oregon considering legalisation
1973 AD : US Shafer Commission, appointed by Nixon, declares that personal use of marijuana should be decriminalised as should casual distribution of small amounts for no or insignificant renumeration
1973 AD : UN Convention of Psychotropic Substances: cannabis is a narcotic.
1974 AD : US Senate report on Marijuana-Hashish Epidemic and its Impact on US Security claims that cannabis use cause brain damage, a-motivation and genetic and reproductive defects
1975 AD : Hundreds of US doctors call for more research on cannabis.
1975 AD : Alaska legalises cannabis for personal use. Limit on amount is one ounce.
1975 AD : After 3 years of campaigning to abolish penal sanctions for the consumption of drugs, Pannella forces the police to arrest him, by smoking a joint in public.
1975 AD : Jamaica Studies reveal good health amongst prolific cannabis users. "No impairment of physiological, sensory and perceptual performance, tests of concept formation, abstracting ability, and cognitive style, and tests of memory."
1976 AD : Holland adopts tolerant attitude to cannabis and many coffee shops and youth centres allowed to sell cannabis.
1976 AD : USA New York Times (Jan 5) declares 'Scientists find nothing really harmful about pot'.
1976 AD : Ford administration bans medical research on cannabis. Research on synthetic cannabis analogues allowed to continue. Robert Randal is the first US citizen to receive cannabis from Federal supplies made under the Investigational New Drug (IND) Program.
1976 AD : DuPont declares cannabis is less harmful than alcohol or tobacco and calls for its decriminalisation.
1976 AD : USA President Ford bans medical research on cannabis.
1977 AD : President Carter thinks cannabis should be legalised.
1977 AD : The Australian Senate Standing Committee on Social Welfare (the Baume Committee) recommends treating drug use as a social / medical rather than legal problem. Also that criminal sanction of possession of cannabis be replaced by fines while retaining penalties for possession of hashish, oil and purified THC.
1978 AD : New Mexico allows cannabis sale for medical use.
1978 AD : The New South Wales Joint Parliamentary Committee upon Drugs recommends eliminating criminal sanctions for personal use of cannabis, implementing bond and probation penalties for first offenders and expunging records upon successful completion of these punishments. Also suggest retaining penalties for trafficking in cannabis.
1980 AD : Paul McCartney arrested for cannabis and spends 10 days in prison in Japan.
1980 AD : Costa Rica study reports good health in cannabis users.
1980 AD : May 10 : Smokey Bears in Hyde Park
1981 AD : The Coptic Study claims 'No harm to human brain or intelligence' through cannabis use.
1982 AD : An Analysis of Marijuana Policy, National Research Council of the National Academy of Science, concludes that "a policy of prohibition of supply is preferable only to a policy of complete prohibition of supply and use"
1983 AD : In the UK over 20,000 convictions for possession.
1983 AD : The USA government (Reagan / Bush)orders American Universities to destroy all 1966-76 research work on cannabis.
1985 AD : Winters and DiFranza reveal radioactive material in tobacco may account for half the lung cancer deaths; no radioactive material in cannabis.
1986 AD : 8 July : UK Drug Trafficking Offences Act introduced to enable confiscation of assets from drug dealers
1987 AD : The USA Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy says: "Cannabis can be used on an episodic but continual basis without evidence of social or psychic dysfunction. In many users the term dependence with its obvious connotations, probably is mis-applied... The chief opposition to the drug rests on a moral and political, and not toxicologic, foundation".
1988 AD : 6 September : DEA chief administrative judge, Judge Young, rules the US government should allow the medicinal use of cannabis. He says "Marijuana in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substance known to man". DEA rejects report.
1988 AD : 20 December : UN Convention against illicit traffic in narcotic and psychotropic substances, Vienna, includes cannabis
1988 AD : UK 23,229 people arrested for cannabis offences.
1989 AD : Presidents Reagan and Bush declare war on cannabis; shops selling smoking apparatus outlawed. Urine testing introduced. Recriminalisation, asset and property seizure, armed forces, prison camps, 'Just Say No' campaign, PFDA, DARE, tobacco and nuclear subsidies. Price - per - ounce cannabis worth more than gold. Worldwide prohibition entices organised crime to take control of the cannabis market and make huge profits. Reagan declares victory in War on Drugs. Secretary of State James A Baker reports global war on narcotic production is 'clearly not being won'.
1990 AD : Jack Herer, in his book 'The Emperor Wears No Clothes' offers $10,000 reward to anyone who can disprove his assertion that hemp can 'save the planet'.
1990 AD : Alaska recriminalises cannabis possession
1990's AD :USA voters pass regional measures to allow medicinal use of cannabis. Interest in this and other uses of hemp add new support to campaign for the legal right to social / recreational use of cannabis.
1991 AD : THC receptors found in the brain.
1991 AD : UK 40,000 people arrested for cannabis.
1991 AD : 'Mr. Marijuana', Howard Marks, arrested, taken from Spain to USA, and given 25 years imprisonment for trafficking in cannabis.
1991 AD : UK Judge Pickles advocates legalisation of drugs..
1991 AD : UK MP Tony Banks (labour) advocates legalisation of cannabis.
1991 AD : IND program dropped in USA.
1992 AD : January 22 :California Research Advisory Panel reports that prohibition has a more harmful effect on society and the individual than illegal drugs themselves.
1992 AD : February 19 : UK Government issue licenses to grow cannabis for industrial uses or scientific research
1992 AD : "Medicines often produce side effects. Sometimes they are physically unpleasant. Cannabis too has discomforting side effects, but these are not physical they are political"... The Economist March 28th 1992
1992 AD : USA over 340,000 arrests for cannabis.
1992 AD : Australia licenses hemp farm.
1992 AD : US Investigational New Drug (IND) Program dropped.
1992 AD : USA President Clinton admits he smoked cannabis but did not inhale. Howard Marks admits that he smoked cannabis but never exhaled.
1992 AD : 17 European Cities sign Frankfurt Charter agreeing to tolerate social use of cannabis.
1992 AD : USA Jim Montgomery, a paraplegic who smoked cannabis to relieve muscle spasm, busted for two ounces of marijuana in Oklahoma, arrested and sentenced to life plus 16 years.
1993 AD : Britain eases restrictions on hemp farming. Hempcore is first British company to get a license. Hemp clothes sold in High Street shops. February 19th.
1993 AD : Commander John Grieve of the Metropolitan Police calls for decriminalisation of cannabis.
1993 AD : Raymond Kendall, Head of Interpol, calls for decriminalisation of cannabis.
1993 AD : British Law Lord, Lord Woolf calls for legalisation of cannabis
1993 AD : 22 British MP's call for the establishment of a Royal Commission.
1993 AD : 44 British MP's call for a Royal Commission.
1993 AD : German High Court in Kruhe rules that cannabis prohibition is unconstitutional.
1993 AD : 19 British MP's 'welcome' the German court ruling.
1993 AD : 55 British MP's call for cannabis to be recognised and allowed for treatment of Multiple Sclerosis.
1993 AD : British Home Secretary Michael Howard declares 'War on drugs' and increases maximum fine for possession of cannabis to £2,500.
1993 AD : Over 72,000 UK citizens arrested for cannabis offences.
1993 AD : Canada permits a hemp farm in Ontario province.
1995 AD : Holland lowers the amount one can possess without prosecution to 5 grams (from 30) as a result of powerful international pressures from neighboring countries.
1995 AD : UK Channel 4 Pot Night (March) and BBC Panorama's High Risk (April).
1995 AD : UK Home secretary Michael Howard increases penalties for cannabis offenses.
1995 AD : Clare Short MP (Labour) calls for a Royal Commission on Cannabis and is reprimanded by her party bosses. (October)
1995 AD : European Cannabis Consumers' Union founded in Amsterdam.
1995 AD : USA Dan Perron forms Cannabis Buyers Club to distribute cannabis to the sick.
1995 AD : The European Council which defines political guidelines, orders a study of drug legislation and practice in the Union.
1995 AD : September 16 : First CHIC (Cannabis Hemp Information Club) conference in London.
1995 AD : Under the Clinton administration 1,450,751 people had been arrested for cannabis, 86% being for possession only
1995 AD : November 11 : British journal of the medical profession, The Lancet, states that "The smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health".
1995 AD : Dutch Policy in the Netherlands Studies
1995 AD : Henrion Commission Report, the official French State Commission in charge of drug policy supports decriminalisation of cannabis and calls for a two-year trial period of regulated retail trade in cannabis. The French Government reject these proposals.
1996 AD : Victoria (Australia) State Council urge decriminalisation of cannabis.
1996 AD : May 17 : Sow the Seeds Day, London. 1996 AD : CLCIA announce parliamentary candidates in forthcoming General Election
1996 AD : UK Liberal Democrats Party calls for a Royal Commission on cannabis.
1996 AD ; Lord McCluskey calls for consideration of decriminalisation in UK.
1996 AD : The Institute for the Study of Drug Dependence - Drug Notes - Cannabis 1996, p.8 says:
"All that can be said definitely is that 1) Cannabis use generally precedes the use of other illegal drugs. 2) Cannabis use does not necessarily (or even usually) lead to the use of other illicit drugs."
1996 AD : UK Janet Paraskeno, magistrate and director of National Youth Agency calls for 'legalisation and not decriminalisation'.
1996 AD : George Howarth MP (Labour) says his party do not want a Royal Commission because it might conclude that cannabis should be legalised which a Labour Government would not do anyway.
1996 AD : The Parliament of Luxembourg passes a motion calling for a program 'of common measures for the liberalization of cannabis and its derivatives' along with Belgium and the Netherlands, and the harmonisation of drug laws in Benelux countries.
1996 AD : UK Cannabis Awareness Month (September) on 68th anniversary of the law.
1996 AD : Ireland announces their plans to use cannabis as fuel to replace the use of the dwindling supplies of peat
1996 AD : Dutch town council at Delfzij decides to sell cannabis through their own coffee shop. They name the shop 'Paradox'. Profits used to provide information campaigns against 'soft drugs' in Dutch schools. Meanwhile the Dutch close many coffee shops, bowing to pressures from Germany and France.,br 1996 AD : The Canton of Zurich calls for legalisation of cannabis.
1996 AD : UK Crown Prosecution Service dropping cases of possession and cultivation against some ill people (MS) as 'not in the public interest to proceed'.
1996 AD : California and Arizona pass Propositions allowing the use of cannabis in the treatment of certain illnesses, Clinton is re-elected and the FBI threaten Doctors with prosecution.
1996 AD : A Swiss man, Zimmermann, is given a life sentence in the Maldives, for importing three cannabis seeds, found in his luggage as he flew in from India.
1996 AD : Legalise Ganja Jamaica formed.
1996 AD : In the New Zealand general election the legalise cannabis candidate in Mittertond received 30% of the vote. Overall they received 1.4% of the votes, insufficient to gain a seat under proportional representation.
1996 AD : 100 Italian MP's call for legalisation of cannabis in Italy.
1996 AD : The Sunday Times, 1 Dec, says that out of 45 UK judges questioned 16 wanted to see cannabis legalised.
1996 AD : CLCIA offices are destroyed by fire
1996 AD : June : Scottish Nationalist conference votes to allow cultivation for personal use and research into medical uses of cannabis
Sates "Relatively few adverse clinical effects from the chronic use of marijuana have been documented in humans. However, the criminalization of marijuana use may itself be a health hazard, since it may expose the users to violence and criminal activity."
1997 AD : An 8-year study at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Medicine, concluded that long-term smokers of cannabis do not experience a greater annual decline in lung functions than non-smokers.
Researchers said: "Findings from the present long-term follow-up study of heavy, habitual marijuana smokers argue against the concept that the continuing heavy use of marijuana is a significant factor for the development of [chronic lung disease]"
"No difference were noted between even quite heavy marijuana smoking and non-smoking of marijuana."
Volume 155 of the American Journal of Respiratory and Clinical Care Medicine 1997
1997 AD : January16 : A court in Texas, USA, sentences medical marijuana user, William J. Foster to 93 years imprisonment for cultivation of one plant.
1997 AD : Two Swiss Cantons decide to legalise possession of cannabis in small amounts and ask the national Government to do the same.
1997 AD : The German State of Schlewig-Holstein legalise possession of up to 5 grams of cannabis.
1997 AD : After appeals for clemency from the Swiss Government and letters from CLCIA supporters, the Maldives releases Zimmermann, the man given life for three seeds.
1997 AD : Norwich City Council ban the CLCIA from more stalls because seeds had been given out at previous stalls, the seed being fishing bait. After a letter campaign the council agree that CLCIA can have the stall provided they agree not to give out 'anything which can be used to grow or take an illegal substance'.
1997 AD : In the USA a $2 million study to prove cannabis smoking can cause cancer fails and announces that it does not. The release of the report is delayed due to 'lack of supplies'.
1997 AD : Paul Flynn MP introduces an early Day Motion calling on the Government to recognise the medicinal uses of cannabis and to make it available in tablet form, also congratulating the citizens of California and Arizona.
1997 AD : February 11 : USA Federal Government Authorities, led by Barry R. McCaffrey, Director of National Drug Control Policy, resists the medical supply or cannabis in California and Arizona, threatening to prosecute Doctor's who prescribe or supply it.
1997 AD : UK Legalise Cannabis Party, sponsored by the CLCIA, nominates Howard Marks as Parliamentary Candidate for Legalising Cannabis in the General Election. He receives an average 1.3% of the vote over the four constituencies where he stands.
1997 AD : The UK elects a new Labour Government and the Prime Minister, Tony Blair, says he will not legalise cannabis.
1997 AD : Scottish Kirk (Church) comes out in favour of legalising cannabis
1997 AD : Rob Christopher, founder of CHIC - the Cannabis Hemp Information Club - in London, changes his name to Free Rob Cannabis and invites arrest by distributing cannabis cookies on the steps of the Department of Heath in London. He is not arrested.
1997 AD : USA marines use helicopters to destroy marijuana crops in Hawaii despite objections from the people.
1997 AD : The Kaiser Permanente Study (USA) - "Marijuana Use and Mortality" April 1997 American Journal of Public Health concludes "Relatively few adverse clinical effects from the chronic use of marijuana have been documented in humans. However, the criminalization of marijuana use may itself be a health hazard, since it may expose the users to violence and criminal activity."
1997 AD : Researchers at the University of California (UCLA) School of Medicine announced the results of an 8 - year study into the effects of long-term cannabis smoking on the lungs. In Volume 155 of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Dr. D.P. Tashkin reported: "Findings from the present long-term, follow-up study of heavy, habitual marijuana smokers argue against the concept that continuing heavy use of marijuana is a significant risk factor for the development of [chronic lung disease. ..Neither the continuing nor the intermittent marijuana smokers exhibited any significantly different rates of decline in [lung function] " as compared with those individuals who never smoked marijuana. Researchers added: "No differences were noted between even quite heavy marijuana smoking and nonsmoking of marijuana."
1997 AD : June : A plaque placed on a park bench in Chapelfield Gardens in Norwich, commemorates Howard Marks stand as a Legalise Cannabis Candidate
1997 AD : July: The British Medical Association (BMA) recommends the provision of medicinal cannabis in the UK.
1997 AD : July: The Attorney General and Minister for Industrial Relations, Australia, JW Shaw QC MLC, announced the end of prison sentences for young cannabis offenders, saying that "I believe many parents would see the imprisonment of their son or daughter for using cannabis as particularly harmful."
1997 AD : July: SYDNEY MORNING HERALD July 21 1997 p5 reports "A survey of a traditionally conservative NSW electorate has shown overwhelming community support for the decriminalisation of cannabis." New South Wales then decriminalises possession of cannabis - up to 5 plants, 30 grams of leaf, 3 grms of resin and 2 grams of oil.
1997 AD : August: UK. After the shooting of a five-year old boy in Bolton in a drug-related attack, Labour MP Brian Iddon calls for a Royal Commission on drugs with a view to decriminalisation. The Sun conducts a poll that showed that over 40% of its readers are in favour of decriminalisation. Labour Home Office spokesman George Howarth says on Radio 4 News that cannabis causes harm and that Labour will never have dialogue on legalisation and that the only solution is to stamp it out.
1997 AD : On September 19th, Marco Pannella is sentenced by the Rome Court to 4 months imprisonment commuted to 8 months on probation, for distributing hashish at the Porta Portese.
1997 AD : September : Sir Paul McCartney, ex-Beatle, reconfirms his call to decriminalise cannabis.
1997 AD : September 28th : UK newspaper The Independent on Sunday, starts their committed campaign to decriminalise cannabis backed by over 100 names of celebrities, doctors, academics etc.
1997 AD : September 28th : A picnic in Chapelfield Gardens, Norwich, to commemorate the sad prohibition laws is attended by over 100 people and cannabis is openly smoked on film by TV cameras. On this the 69th anniversary of the Dangerous Drugs Act, Rob Christopher and some 300 others gather in Hyde Park, London, to distribute cannabis cakes free to medical users. Rob then unsuccessfully attempted to turn himself in to the police.
1997 AD : October 8: Lord Bingham of Cornhill, the most senior judge in England and Wales backed calls for a public debate on the legalisation of cannabis. Just days after Jack Straw, the Home Secretary, ruled out moves to legalise cannabis
1997 AD : November 5 : EU Parliament Committee on Civil Liberties suggests that soft drugs should be legalised
1997 AD : December 3: The French secretary of State for Public Health, Bernard Kouchner, in favor of the supply of heroin to people suffering from severe heroin addiction. He also supports the medical application of cannabis, according to an interview with Dr Kouchner MD in the newspaper Liberation.
1997 AD : December 11 : Independent on Sunday hold their "Should cannabis be decriminalised?" conference in Westminster, London. Although all the MPs have been invited only 5 turn up. The conference was overwhelmingly in favour of legalisation
1997 AD : December 19th : DEA formally asked the Department of Health and Human Services to conduct "a scientific and medical evaluation of the available data and provide a scheduling recommendation" for marijuana and other cannabinoid drugs. This DEA request of HHS means that the DEA has for the first time made its own determination that sufficient grounds exist to remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA). Schedule I is supposed to be limited to hard drugs with addictive propensities and with no legitimate medical usage.
1997 AD : December 20 : British Home Secretary, Jack Straw (Labour) is told by the Daily Mirror that his son, William, sold 10 pounds worth of cannabis to a reporter Dawn Alford. Straw immediately escorts his own son to a police station to turn himself in. The lad is cautioned several weeks later.
1998 AD : March: Madrid - European and American scientists defended medical marihuana at an International Symposium on Cannabis and the Brain held at the Fundacion Ramon Areces. According to them, the plant is effective in treating people with cancer and multiple sclerosis, but is not addictive.
1998 AD : Australia : March : Victoria's police commissioner, Mr Neil Comrie, has admitted the fight against drugs has failed and is set to introduce a radical statewide plan to keep drug users out of courts.
1998 AD : Conservative MP David Prior becomes the third British MP to publicly admit having smoked cannabis. He is against legalisation.
1998 AD : MORE than 100 French artists and intellectuals signed a petition admitting to taking soft drugs and offering themselves for prosecution.
1998 AD : March 28: About 20,000 people marched from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square in the Decriminalise Cannabis March organised by the Independent on Sunday, CLCIA and others. Speakers in the Square included Howard Marks, Rosie Boycott, Paul Flynn MP and Caroline Coon. The new UK Anti-Drugs Coordinator, Keith Hallawell, arrogantly stated that the march was a Red Herring (irrelevant).
1998 AD : UK : Times 24 March 1998 : A judge allowed a liver transplant patient to go free after he admitted growing and using cannabis to ease his pain. Sympathising with him, Judge John Hopkin said: "I accept that's why you were growing it; to relieve the considerable pain you must suffer. That is against the law as it stands at the present time, but there is very substantial mitigation in your case." Richard Gifford, 49, a father of 6 was given a two year conditional discharge at Nottingham crown court after pleading guilty to producing and possessing cannabis. The judge said "Whether this substance should be obtained by prescription is a matter for parliament, but it does seem from a number of cases that appear before me that it is benefit to a number of persons." Paddy Tipping, PPS to Jack Straw, the Home secretary said the government has no plans to decriminalise cannabis "People like Judge Hopkin say the acknowledge there is a valuable medical effect, but there has been no compelling research done to suggest that".
1998 AD : April: Czech Republic - President Vaclav Havel vetoes a law banning possession of drugs for personal use and sent it back to Parliament, citing human rights concerns. "The President reached the opinion that the law would lead to the prosecution of victims rather than culprits," said spokesman Ladislav Spacek. Drug experts have warned that the legislation could lead to an increase in crime and drug prices and a decline in the willingness of addicts to be cured. - Reuters
1998 AD : 4 April: A man accused of growing and giving cannabis to his wife, a multiple sclerosis sufferer, was cleared by a jury's majority verdict of cultivating, cultivating with intent to supply, and supplying cannabis. Cab driver Alan Blythe, 52, of Runcorn, Cheshire, had used the defence of duress of circumstances, which the jury at Warrington Crown Court accepted. He claimed he had grown the cannabis and supplied it to his wife Judith, 48, because he was afraid that without it the acute symptoms of MS could trigger her suicide. The jury ignored the judge's suggestion that Mr Blythe had failed to prove duress of circumstances for the charge of cultivation. But they followed this advice in relation to possession, for which Mr Blythe was fined £100.
1998 AD : 21 April Belgium officially decriminalises cannabis after a decision by Minister de Clerck of Justice. That is you will not be prosecuted for possession for personal consumption.
1998 AD : SAN FRANCISCO April 22, 1998 -- A San Francisco marijuana club reopened under another name just a day after a court order shut down its predecessor.
1998 AD : Italy decriminalises possession of drugs and permits small scale cultivation of cannabis for own use.
1998 AD : Danny Tungate polled 7.6% of the vote as a Legalise Cannabis Candidate in the UK local elections, Catton Grove ward, Norwich
1998 AD : June 12: The UK Government has granted a license to grow and possess cannabis for the purposes of medical trials, to Dr Geoffrey Guy of GW Pharmaceuticals. The crop at a secret location in south-east England, is guarded by electrified razor-wire fences, security cameras and guard dogs.
1998 AD : Whilst US Federal Authorities make threats and arrests of Californian doctors who recommend cannabis and force the closure of most medical marijuana clubs in the state, Oakland by-pass federal law by appointing medical marijuana suppliers as deputies thereby making them immune from arrest.
1998 AD : Germany: A petition of 30 thousand signatures organised by the "Selbsthilfegruppe Cannabis als Medizin" in Berlin was handed in to the Senat of Berlin in March 1998. All governing parties (CDU, SPD, PDS and Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen) discussed the issue and unanimously support it!
The signaturess being collected currently, will be handed to the "Petitionsausschuss des Deutschen Bundestages" together with the 30 thousand from Berlin.. ACM, Arbeitsgemeinschaft Cannabis als Medizin (Association for Cannabis as Medicine ) 1998 AD : June 5; Colin Davies acquitted of cultivation in the UK after informing the jury of his medical need and despite instructions from the judge that they had to rule on law and evidence alone. See Rights of Jurors.
1998 AD : A group of Welsh Cannabis Smokers headed by Chris Rawley lays prosecution papers upon Jack Straw, Tony Blair, Lord Bingham, a Crown Court Judge and Tenby Magistrates, in the process of a public prosecution for crimes against humanity and peace, and crimes against children, for upholding an illegal prohibition of cannabis.
1998 AD : September 5: Release and The Lindesmith Institute organise the symposium "Options for Control in the 21st Century", with experts from around the world gathering in London.
1998 AD : October: CLCIA Chairman challenges local Judge on cannabis safety
1998 AD : November 11: UK. The House of Lords rule that based upon the evidence presented for them the Government should make cannabis available to the sick without further delay, but that they are against legalisation for recreational use. Jack Straw, Home Secretary, immediately rejects the House of Lord's Report saying that cannabis will not be made available until a suitable pharmaceutical standard preparation has been thoroughly tested.
1998 AD : November: "We.. say that on the medical evidence available, moderate indulgence in cannabis has little ill-effect on health, and that decisions to ban or legalise cannabis should be based on other considerations.": The Lancet, vol 352, number 9140, November 14 1998
1998 AD : December 24: Prince Charles tells a sufferer of Multiple Sclerosis that he has heard that cannabis can help.
1999 AD : January 21 : USA: Medicinal Marijuana Advocate, Steve Kubby and Wife Busted
1999 AD : February 23: UK: 55-year-old arthritis sufferer jailed for one year for using cannabis to relieve his pain
1999 AD : March 4 : ALASKA: Medical Marijuana Law Starts
1999 AD : March 15: USA: Federal Judge Gives OK to Pot Case
1999 AD : March 21: USA: Government Study Labels Marijuana A Useful Medicine
1999 AD : March 21: Only 8 People Can Legally Use Pot As MedicineA
1999 AD : March 23: GERMANY: Health Minister Supports Medical Marihuana
1999 AD : March 30: CANADA: Pot Users Take Fewer Road Risks Than Drunks Study Says
1999 AD : April 1: USA: Farmers Lobby to Legalize the Growing of Hemp
1999 AD : April 7: USA: Florida Supreme Court Hears Medical Marijuana Case
1999 AD : March: The LEGALISE CANNABIS ALLIANCE becomes an official political party in the UK. 1999 AD : April 9: UK: Pro-Cannabis Lobby To Stand in Norwich
1999 AD : April 23: SWITZERLAND: Legalising Cannabis
1999 AD : May 1 : Many thousands march for legalisation around the world
1999 AD : May 6 : UK: Local Election Results, May 6 1999: Legalise Cannabis Alliance candidates poll average 3.5%.
1999 AD : May 10: USA: NV Assembly Bill Eases Marijuana Penalties
1999 AD : May 20: UK Government objects to cannabis bill 95 MPs support MM bill. Eric Mann's parole revoked to silence him.
1999 AD : June 9 : CANADA: Two Patients Get Federal Go-Ahead To Smoke Pot
1999 AD : June 11: US Kentucky: Hemp Museum Opens Doors To History Of Versatile Plant
1999 AD : June 11: NEW ZEALAND: Advice To Review Dope Law Repeated
1999 AD : June 13: UK: Cannabis Inhalers In First Legal Health Test
1999 AD : June 21: CANADA: Compassion Club To Grow Pot In Homes Of Members
1999 AD : June 21: SCOTLAND: Doctors Back Legalising Cannabis:
1999 AD : June 24: JAMAICA: Official Encourages Cultivation Of Hemp
1999 AD : June 30: UK: Jails Chief Says Drug Test Regime Is Useless
1999 AD: September 6: UK: MS Patients Recruited To Test Cannabis Pill 1999 AD : Oct. 14: Kingston, Jamaica: The Jamaican Senate has unanimously approved a resolution establishing a commission to explore the decriminalisation of marijuana.
1999 AD : Nov 25: The Legalise Cannabis Alliance candidate in the Kensington and Chelsea By-election, Colin Paisley gained 141 votes, 8th out of 18 candidates.
2000 AD : Jan 12: CANADA: Hepatitis C Patient Wins Right To Smoke Pot
2000 AD : March 6: UK: First Conference Of The Legalise Cannabis Alliance
2000 AD : March 25: UK: Inquiry Calls For Softer Line On Hard Drugs - But Blair Says No
2000 AD : March 29: SWITZERLAND: Swiss Parliament Legalises Cannabis
2000 AD : March 30: Malaysian Gets Life For Growing Cannabis Plant
2000 AD: April 4: MALAWI: Minister Steps Up Campaign To Legalise Marijuana
2000 AD: May 4: The Legalise Cannabis Alliance fields 5 candidates in Norwich local elections (Sarah Homes, Mick Pryce, Hugh Robertson, Trevor Smith, Tina Smith), one in Peterborough (Marcus Davies). Derrick Large receives over 400 votes in the Romsey by-election won by a Liberal Democrat.
2000 AD: May 6: Hundreds of thousands of people march for the end of the War on Cannabis
2000 AD: June 28: CANADA: Medical Pot Grower Cleared
2000 AD: June 28: NETHERLANDS: Dutch cannabis vote irks cabinet
2000 AD: July 17: USA CA: Federal Judge Clears Way for Oakland Club to Distribute Pot to Seriously Ill Patients
2000 AD: July 31: CANADA: Pot Prohibition Unconstitutional, Rules Court Of Appeals
2000 AD: August 1: UK: Rheumatoid Arthritis Treatment From Cannabis
2000 AD: August 15: USA CA: Appeals Court Approves Marijuana As Medicine
2000 AD: September 6: EUROPE: Dutch, Swiss and German Governments To Act on Marijuana
2000 AD: September 8: USA CA: Doctors' Rights Backed Under Pot Law
2000 AD: September 9: GUAM: High Court Ruling Backs Rastafarian's Sacrament - Cannabis:
2000 AD: September 14: USA CA: Feds Rule Doctors May Recommend Pot
2000 AD: September 28: UK: MS Sufferer Cleared Of Cannabis Charge
2000 AD: October: Canadian Government Will Legalize Medical Marijuana Use
2000 AD: October 20: UK: Cannabis Less Harmful Than Aspirin, Says Scientist
2000 AD: November 24: USA: CA: Study Of Pot's Benefits To AIDS Patients Gets DEA's Blessing
2000 AD: December 22: CANADA: Legal Marijuana Operation Opens
2001 AD: 4 January: CANADA: Firm Grows Medical Pot In Mine Shaft
2001 AD: 19 January: BELGIUM: Seen Decriminalising Cannabis Use
2001 AD: 10 March: SWITZERLAND: Move To Legalise Cannabis
2001 AD: 21 March: MEXICO: Leader Backs Call To Legalize Drugs
2001 AD: 22 March: UK: Lords Urge Legal Use Of Cannabis
2001 AD: 7 April: CANADA: Gravely Ill To Get Medical Pot
2001 AD: 26 April: USA: Legalize Marijuana, New Mexico Governor Urges
2001 AD: 11 June: Pot Smokers Just As Healthy - Study
2001 AD: 25 June: UK: Home Secretary Praises Cannabis Scheme
2001 AD: 1 July: UK: Drug Czar Recants: Cannabis Use Does Not Lead To Heroin
2001 AD: 4 July: CANADA: Legal-Marijuana Users To Get Photo Id Cards
2001 AD: 5 July: UK: In One Part Of London, Police Turn Blind Eye To Marijuana To Target Harder Crime
2001 AD: 19 August: FIJI: Marijuana a Fiji Election Issue: A Fijian high chief has said his people should be shot dead if found planting marijuana
2001 AD: 13 September: FRANCE: Koucher Opposes Drugs Law
2001 AD: 20 October: THE NETHERLANDS: Dutch Government Plans To Put Cannabis On Prescription
2001 AD: 14 December: INDONESIA: Marijuana Trafficker Gets Death Sentence
2001 AD: 16 December: UK: Study Finds No Cannabis Link To Hard Drugs
2002 AD: 25 January: NORWAY: Commission Set To Call For Decriminalization
2002 AD: 16 February: KENYA: Hashish Traffickers Jailed For 45 Years
2002 AD: 9 March: UK: Lib Dems back radical drug reforms
2002 AD: 12 March: CANADA: Doctors Want Marijuana Decriminalized
2002 AD: 14 March: UK: Reclassify Cannabis, Says Official Report
2002 AD: 1 June: MEXICO: Chihuahua Considers Legalizing Pot
2002 AD: 29 June: PHILIPPINES: Death For Marijuana
2002 AD: 10 July: David Blunkett's Announcement of reclassification of Cannabis, and Oliver Letwin's reply in Parliament
2002 AD: July: Australian Police Close Cannabis Cafe.
2002 AD: July: UK Drugs Tsar Halliwell Resigns Over Plans To Reclassify Cannabis Possession.
2002 AD: July: Canadian Judge Says Medical Cannabis Is Not Illegal.
2002 AD: August: Israeli Government Approves Use Of Cannabis By Terminally Ill.
2002 AD: October: Colin Davies Who Opened The Dutch Experience Cannabis Cafe In Stockport, UK, Is Sentenced To Three Years In Prison For Cannabis Offences.
2002 AD: November: Kenya Considers Legalising Bhang.
2002 AD: November: UK Doctors Announce Cannabis Extracts Used In Trials On MS And Pain Patients Proving Effective.
2002 AD: November: Czech Doctors Claim Cannabis Helps Sufferers Of Parkinson's Disease.
2002 AD: December: US Study Defies Gateway Theory That Cannabis Use Leads To Use Of Hard Drugs.
2002 AD: December: Canadian Judge Orders Police To Return Medical Cannabis.
2002 AD: December UK: Oakland, US, City Authorities Deputise Medical Marijuana Club Founders.
2003 AD: February: US Jurors Become Angry That Trial Judge Had Not Informed Them That Ed Rosenthal Was Deputised by City Authorities in Oakland, after they convicted him of cultivation.
2003 AD: February: UN Narcotics Control Board Questions Canada's Policy On Use Of Marijuana
2003 AD: February: US Police Arrest 55 Suppliers Of Cannabis Paraphernalia.
2003 AD: March: Pharmacies in The Netherlands Sell Medical Cannabis Which Is More Expensive Than Many Coffeeshops.
2003 AD: March: Danish Drug Dealers Go On Strike
2003 AD: March: JAMAICA: Bill To Legalise Ganja For Private Use
2003 AD: April: RUSSIA: Nostalgic Small Town Puts Cannabis On Its Flag
2006 AD: April: "Marijuana is the equivalent of heroin and cocaine". FDA issues statement denying that marijuana has
any medical benefits at all
2006 AD: May: Mexican Congress passes bill legalising all drugs for private personal use. The officially permitted quantities: up to five grams of marijuana; five grams of opium; 25 milligrams of heroin; 500 milligrams of cocaine; a few tabs of Ecstasy; small quantities of amphetamines and magic mushrooms; and up to a kilo of the sacred cactus peyote. Vicente Fox, Mexico’s president, pledges to sign the Bill - but capitulates to US government pressure 24 hours later. The bill is returned to Congress for revision.
2006 AD: October: CNN reports that Canadian troops "...battle 10-foot Afghan marijuana plants".
2006 AD: October: Medical marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal, "the guru of ganja",is indicted on new criminal charges.
2006 AD: December: A UK court rules that chocolate bars laced with cannabis for multiple sclerosis sufferers are unlawful. The owners of “Canna-Biz” posted some 36,000 cannabis-laced chocolate bars to more than 1,800 multiple sclerosis victims
2006 AD: December: official US statistics suggests that marijuana is America's leading cash crop
2007 AD: April: Harvard university study shows that Delta-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in marijuana, cuts tumour growth in common lung cancer in half and significantly reduces the ability of the cancer to spread
2008 AD: Medical marijuana vending machines take root in Los Angeles. The DEA is not amused.
2008 AD: May : UK government announces cannabis will be upgraded from class C to Class B. Its scientific experts, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, recommend cannabis should remain class C.

Drunken and loutish holidaymakers have sent Britain's reputation abroad plunging to new depths.A shocking Foreign Office report reveals a huge rise in the number of arrests of Britons overseas.Figures covering 15 holiday destinations show there were 4,603 arrests last year, up 15.6 per cent.There were 4,603 arrests of Britons at 15 holiday destinations last year (file photo)
Arrests of UK citizens in Spain - by far the biggest problem country - have gone up by a third. In France, they have rocketed by 42 per cent in one year.The report makes clear the devastating impact of alcohol. It says: 'Many arrests are due to behaviour caused by excessive drinking.
'Be aware that travel insurance may not cover you if you have an accident whilst under the influence of alcohol.'The report, British Behaviour Abroad, highlights the perils of excessive drinking by women on holiday that could leave them more vulnerable to rape.
It urges women to cover up, wear 'appropriate dress' and behave in line with local customs noting: 'Alcohol is the most frequently used drug in drug-assisted rape.'
The highest number of reported rapes was in Spain, with 29, followed by Greece (28) and Turkey (21)
Scenes of drunken behaviour have become an all-too-common feature in holiday destinations.On the Greek island of Crete, police trying to clean up the reputation of popular resorts such as Malia have warned British tourists that they face arrest if their drinking looks as if it could get them into trouble.Zakynthos, too, has been blighted by alcohol-fuelled violence. Many blame the thousands of young British visitors, attracted by cheap drunks and raucous night life.Heavy drinking and loutish behaviour by rowdy British tourists has become so bad in the island's biggest resort of Laganas that the mayor has raised the matter with the British ambassador to Greece.
Mayor Dionisis Komiotis has condemned inappropriate behaviour in his town and wants to see families returning to the resort.He said: 'We don't want the young people to walk out naked to cause problems and damage.'We don't want them to annoy the rest of the guests and tourists and, of course, put their own lives in danger.
'We want the young people to enjoy themselves and go back home healthy and happy.'

Even after the embarrassing episode of a Tanzanian national taking a flight from Mumbai to Malaysia carrying 1.3 kg heroin in his stomach, the Mumbai Airport authorities are still to procure equipment that can actually detect narcotics carried within a person’s body.
The Tanzanian national had flown to Malaysia from Mumbai on August 11. Though the man was carrying 1.3 kg heroin in 80-odd one-inch packets in his stomach, they went undetected by the newly installed Itemiser3 system-contraband detector at the Mumbai Airport. Though the 26-year-old man was able to give a slip to customs officials here, he slipped into coma after collapsing on board.
He was rushed to a hospital in Malaysia soon after the plane landed. An X-ray revealed that the man had packets of heroin in his stomach. The drugs, doctors said, had leaked into his stomach. The man was subsequently arrested on drug-trafficking charges.
Following the slip in the security procedure, the Mumbai Airport is now planning to install state-of-the-art walkthrough explosives and narcotics detectors in the next six months at an estimated cost of Rs Rs 68.5 lakh.
Mumbai customs officials had failed to detect the drugs carried by the Tanzanian national as the Rs 15-lakh-Itemiser3 system-contraband detector can detect drugs only in suspicious baggage and parcels, not when they are hidden in body.
In order to nab offenders such as in this case until now, customs officials have had to rely solely on tip-offs.
“We have to rely on our intelligence officers for information about suspects or on sniffer dogs,” G Ravindranath, additional commissioner, customs, said.
The Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) is currently waiting for approval from the aviation ministry and Bureau of Civil Aviation (BCAS) to install new narcotics detectors at the airport.
“We will install these walkthrough explosive and narcotics detectors within a period of six months,” Philip Cash, managing director, MIAL said.
These new detectors or ‘puffers’ will be used to scan only profiled passengers.
“It is difficult to scan or frisk all passengers that come to Mumbai Airport every day. Only those passengers who behave suspiciously will be scanned by this new device. The machine may not help us detect narcotics within the body, but it will definitely boost our security procedures,” a customs official said.
‘DRUG MULES’ WHO HAD GIVEN AIRPORT CUSTOMS A SLIP DEC 10, 2007, HEATHROW:The effectiveness of equipment and procedures designed to catch ‘drug mules’ had been called into question following the case of a woman who died when bags of smuggled cocaine burst inside her body hours after hi-tech screening at Heathrow Airport failed to pick up that she was carrying drugs.A post-mortem revealed that Nicola Last’s blood was “saturated” with cocaine, but customs officers did not spot that her body was packed with 34 bags of the class A drug, worth Rs 39 lakh.
JUNE 28, 1999, MUMBAI: Alhaji Soni Giwa managed to give Mumbai Airport authorities the slip even though he was carrying around 35 four-inch-long capsules containing heroin in his abdomen. Later, he was found unconscious near Santacruz station and was taken to hospital. When Giwa’s body was opened up for an autopsy, several small capsules were found in his abdominal cavity, one of which had burst open, the police said.These capsules were covered with tape and contained white powder, possibly heroin.

Last week the governor of the Afghan central bank adjusted World Bank estimates for his country's economic growth in 2008. What was the verdict? A 50 percent decrease in gross domestic product (GDP). Among the reasons cited for the change were a harsh winter, drought, rising food prices and a significant decrease in foreign investment. The latter, he noted, is driven by the increased activity of the Taliban insurgency, corruption and poor infrastructure. One aspect of the economy he did not directly refer to is the opium trade. Why not? Coincidentally, that sector is doing just fine.
At a time when foreign policy and military debates are shifting toward Afghanistan and how to secure its stability and development in the context of US national security interests, it is only fair to put counter-narcotic strategy on the hot seat. Specifically, what can we do to improve it? To answer this, we must first recognize two caveats. First, counter-narcotic strategy is a long-term affair requiring a balance between aggressive measures, e.g. eradication, and softer approaches, e.g. poverty reduction. This means that the slashing of poppy fields must be complemented by the creation of alternative sources of income and regional interdiction of drug shipments. Second, the policy is only as reliable as the government institutions it empowers. For instance, legal prosecution of narcotic traffickers is wholly dependent on competent judicial systems including incorruptible police, lawyers, and judges. With these assumptions in mind, let's look at two inhibitors of successful counter-narcotic strategy—corruption and regional cooperation.
The head of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in Afghanistan last month spoke of criminal networks that maneuver for the release of drug trafficking suspects from pre-trial detention with a single cell phone call. With a process that painless, it is not difficult to assume that these are the same networks with political connections up to the highest level of government in Kabul. According to the State Department's former coordinator for counter-narcotic strategy in Afghanistan, President Hamid Karzai instructed the attorney general to refrain from prosecuting senior government officials accused of corruption, and in some cases collusion in the drug trade, "for political reasons."
A strategy to target these drug trade actors at the top of the food chain, senior government officials and agents of the trafficking network, should be actively pursued. This plan should involve restricting access to financial resources by freezing bank assets, limiting movement by placing restrictions on travel, and the immediate removal of provincial-level law enforcement administrators compromised by corruption. Collaboration on complementary counter-narcotic strategies with other countries in the region is another factor to consider.
Recent developments give hope to the prospect of cooperation in combating the flow of narcotics across Asia and the Middle East. Coalition warships in the Arabian Gulf, consisting of the US and British navies, seized over 30 tons of narcotics in the past few months according to a recent US Navy statement. In the United Arab Emirates this week, police seized nearly US$11 million worth of heroin and arrested 19 Afghan suspects in connection with the seizure. Even the military dictatorship regime in Burma got into the act, claiming the arrest of over 300 traffickers and multiple opium seizures during the month of July.
European nations with diplomatic contact in Tehran, some whose troops in NATO are fighting the very same Taliban financed in part by the drug trade, would do well to openly raise their concerns over regional narcotic trafficking with the Iranians. Another immediate neighbor, Pakistan, also needs to take ownership of its complicity in the regional drug trade. As a Brookings Institution senior expert on the Middle East and South Asia recently noted, "If 90 percent of the world's heroin is grown in Afghanistan, almost all of it is shipped through the Port of Karachi."
US pressure on Pakistan to chase drug trafficking within its borders and on its shores is imperative. The billions of dollars being wired through the US Defense Department to the government in Islamabad for anti-terrorist assistance can be leveraged for greater cooperation on this front. The Taliban and affiliated insurgents, who roam freely in the tribal border areas in western Pakistan, directly profit from the opium trade. These groups may be able to eventually recover from the financial repercussions of a disrupted drug trade, but it would nonetheless knock them off balance and debilitate their ability to readily procure the resources necessary to inflict the kind of damage witnessed in last month's Indian Embassy bombing in Kabul or the recent bridge bombing in Peshawar. Indeed, Pakistan must remain an ally and conducive to US interests in the region. However, a little tough love diplomacy with Islamabad in the context of counter-narcotic strategy is warranted under the circumstances. Rooting out internal corruption in Afghanistan and leveraging regional support are not a comprehensive counter-narcotic policy. Increased focus on these two areas, however, could stimulate foreign investment for the Afghans and weaken an enemy in the region.

280 people were admitted to hospitals in the Bristol area due to drug problems last year, according to new figures.
The Department of Health data shows that more than half of admissions for drug poisoning and drug-related mental health disorders in the former Avon area from 2006 to 2007 were in the Bristol local authority, where a total of 155 people went into hospital.
The latest figures form part of an annual report carried out by the Government to determine just how many people are using drugs across the country.
As well as the numbers of hospital admissions by primary care trust – the local authority areas that commission health services – the report had statistics for the number of under-16s taking drugs and figures for drug-taking by age, gender and type of substance.
In Bristol 139 people were admitted to hospital for drug poisoning, much lower than in Leeds, which reported the highest number of admissions with 236 during the 12-month period. In the South West the next highest number of admissions was in Devon where there were 103 cases.
Bristol recorded 16 hospital admissions for mental health and behavioural disorders associated with drug-taking, while Somerset had 115.
In Bath & North East Somerset (B&NES) there were 43 drug poisoning incidents, 29 in North Somerset and 35 in South Gloucestershire.
Drug-associated mental health admissions accounted for eight cases in B&NES, eight in South Gloucestershire and less than six in North Somerset, although the PCT would not reveal the exact figure.
University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust said that drug-related diagnosis accounted for about 1.6 per cent of all people admitted to hospital in 2006 to 2007. In North Bristol drug-related admissions accounted for 1.7 per cent of all admissions.
Associate director of public health in Bristol, Barbara Coleman, said: "Treatment for drug misuse is a priority in Bristol. Figures for the treatment of drug misuse will be higher than elsewhere in the South West as we've got many more problem drug misusers in Bristol than any other area in the South West. However, we're making significant improvements to care in Bristol.
"In Bristol there are estimated to be around 8,000 drug misusers and more than 50 per cent are currently in some form of treatment programme."
Initiatives in the city include shared-care services with GPs supported by experts such as the Bristol Drugs Project.
There are also specialist nurses at the BRI who are able to recognise if a patient admitted for any reason, is a drug misuser. They can then ensure the patients get appropriate care. These nurses are also training other nurses to recognise drug misusers and to be able to refer patients on to other services.

The UK has the highest rate of drug misuse in Europe and the abuse of illicit drugs is a major social problem, not least because of the public health implications. Aids/HIV and other blood-borne diseases are global pandemics and there is a huge ignorance in the UK about these, and sexually transmitted infections, which are also linked with drug abuse. The legalisation of drugs would lead inevitably to a greater number of addictions, an increased burden on the health and social services, and there would be no compensating diminution in criminal justice costs as, contrary to the view held by legalisers, crime would not be eliminated or reduced. A great deal of media attention has been focused on a call for the legalisation of drugs by a former civil servant who was responsible for the Cabinet's anti-drug unit. In The Independent last week, Julian Critchley said that legalisation would be "less harmful than the current strategy" and that an "overwhelming majority of professionals in the field" agree with that view.
Now he has become a teacher, his dangerously naive views appear to be more harmful than an inadequate UK drug policy, and he must associate with a limited group of professionals if his assertion is not gross exaggeration. The majority of people in the UK do not wish to see drugs legalised, and only 6 per cent of the global population between the ages of 15-64 use drugs; this is hardly justification for legalisation.Perhaps it is not widely known that there is a global movement to overturn the United Nations Conventions and secure the legalisation of all drugs driven by people who see huge profits to be had from marketing another addictive substance. Research has demonstrated that the dependency rate for "legal" drugs among those who chose to use them would be around 50 per cent, the same as tobacco, which is why major companies are turning to developing countries in order to encourage smoking.
Recently, a TV programme discussed the issue, and several members of the public phoned in their views, most of which were responsibly opposed to the misuse of drugs. However, it was alarming to hear several people say that they thought that legalising drugs would be the most effective way of dealing with the problem. All of these good people believed that such action would defeat the traffickers, take the profit out of the drug trade and solve the drug problem completely. There was no consideration given to the fact that there is a thriving black market in the legal drugs of alcohol and tobacco, and no awareness of the huge administrative burden that would be created by setting up a government department to tax and administer drugs if legalisation had occurred. There was no awareness of the devious ways in which drug traffickers would circumvent the legislation and no thought given to the huge increase in addiction/dependency that would automatically follow such an ill-advised move, with the tremendous damage that would be visited on the health services in perpetuity. The tax demands would rocket as a consequence.
It is always asserted that legalisation would take the profit out of drug trafficking and would result in a huge drop in crime but, short of the Government distributing free drugs, those who commit crime now to obtain their drugs would continue to do so if they became legal. It is seldom made clear which drugs the legalisers are referring to and to whom they should become available. Is it the position that they wish to legalise "crack" and will all people, regardless of age and mental condition, be able to buy them?The cumulative effects of prohibition and interdiction, combined with education and treatment during 100 years of International Drug Control, have had a significant impact in stemming the drug problem. Legalisation would be likely to convince people that any legal activity cannot be very harmful, increase the availability of drugs, increase the harmful consequences associated with drugs and remove the social sanctions normally supported by the legal system.All drugs, including prescription and over-the-counter medicines, can be dangerous if they are taken without attention to appropriate medical advice. Instead of calling for legalisation, it would be far more sensible, as Nick Harding suggested in his article about cannabis use in yesterday's Independent, to seek improved policies. The compassionate and sensible approach should be that we do everything possible to reduce addiction and drug abuse, not encourage it.

One in three British children lives in relative poverty, Government advisers claim. Soaring numbers are depressed and in fear of crime, says a report from the four children's commissioners in the UK. Compared with youngsters in mainland Europe, they drink a lot more alcohol, start having sex earlier and are more likely to use cannabis, it adds. The findings, to be presented to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in Geneva this week, will be a setback for Gordon Brown, who has placed a high priority on closing the gap between children from rich and poor families.A third of children in the UK are now living in poverty, according to Government offendersIn the report, the commissioners say: 'It is unacceptable that a country as wealthy as the UK has 3.8million children (one in three) living in relative poverty.'Nearly 1.3million children are living in severe poverty in the UK and there is a relatively high likelihood of severe poverty among children living in London, Wales and Northern Ireland.' The mental health of children in England has 'deteriorated' over the past 30 years, say the authors. They place some of the blame on the 'target-driven' education system which leads to 'increased anxiety and stress'. They insist that a key priority for the Government must be to tackle the 'adverse effects of testing on children'. The report declares: 'Children feel increasingly pressurised, in particular, by school, exams and commercial marketing.'
It is also critical of high-profile attempts to tackle bullying which largely fail to work.

A study by the children's commissioners covering England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland found: "Compared to other European countries, children drink a lot more alcohol, engage in early sex and are more likely to use cannabis."Children feel increasingly unsafe in their local area, with one in four concerned about violence, crime and weapons."The commissioners also hit out at growing "discrimination" against youngsters.They said shop signs banning two or more children made them feel like second class citizens.The report, to be given to the United Nations in Geneva this week, also criticised the education system for setting too many targets and exams.

British children are being "demonised" by a society that is locking too many of them up, according to watchdogs. The joint report by children's commissioners for all parts of the UK said attitudes towards youngsters were hardening across the country.
The experts said crime committed by children had fallen between 2002 and 2006, but the numbers criminalised had gone up by just over a quarter. Their conclusions are part of a United Nations review of standards in the UK.
The four commissioners were appointed in a move to ensure children's rights are more effectively recognised by policy-makers. Their report will be presented to the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child. In their document, the commissioners said most children were happy and that policy-makers were trying to improve the situation. Ben Kelly on how he's turned his life around
They added that too many children were being put through the criminal justice system and the poverty experienced by one in three youngsters was unacceptable for a rich nation. The experts said more children were scared in their neighbourhoods and, citing previous studies, drank more alcohol, had deteriorating mental health and felt more pressure at school than their European peers.
Public bodies are legally bound to put the best interests of a child first in decision-making. But the commissioners said this key legal safeguard had failed in some parts of the youth justice system for England and Wales. "The system is dominated by a punitive approach and does not sufficiently distinguish between adult offenders and children who break the law," says the report. "Compared to other European countries, England has a very low age of criminal responsibility and high numbers of children are locked up. Too many children are being criminalised and brought into the youth justice system at an increasingly young age."
The report attacks the use by some shop-keepers, businesses and local authorities of the Mosquito teen deterrent.
The device emits a high-pitched squeal which can generally only be heard by the under-25s. While ministers had not endorsed Mosquito, the commissioners said they had also done nothing to ban technology which indiscriminately affected those within its range.
This over-use of custody absorbs vast resources which would be better spent on tackling the causes of these problems by preventive work in the community Paul Cavadino, Nacro Kathleen Marshall, Scotland's commissioner, said: "We have highlighted areas that remain a concern, including significant differences in juvenile justice in some parts of the UK and the public's attitudes towards children and young people. She added: "We look forward to briefing the Committee in Geneva to outline the findings of our report and to work with the Committee to make sure we can help improve things for children and young people in a tangible, sustainable and meaningful way." Responding to the report, Children's Minister Beverley Hughes said: "We are 100% committed to improving children's wellbeing. Over the course of this government more than 600,000 children have been lifted out of poverty, almost 3,000 children's centres have been built and school funding has been increased by 87%.

new study, commissioned by the Scottish Government, reveals the depth of the nation's drink and drug problem and its relation to homicide and suicide.Researchers found there were 500 killings in Scotland over five years and 5000 suicides over six years. Both these figures amount to almost double the rates for England and Wales.
The report, Lessons for Mental Health Care in Scotland, looked at all suicides and homicides as well as those committed by people who had sought help from mental health services.It shows suicide rates in Scotland stood at 18.7 per 100,000 of the population, compared to 10.2 per 100,000 in England and Wales.Homicide rates north of the border were 2.12 per 100,000 people compared to 1.23 per 100,000 in England and Wales. Only 28% of the people who took their own life and 12% of killers had recently been mental health patients.This north-south divide was highest among teenagers, the report, carried out by Manchester University, found.
"Alcohol and drug misuse runs through these findings and appears to be a major contributor to risk in mental health care and broader society," said Professor Louis Appleby, director of the study."The findings suggest alcohol and drugs lie behind Scotland's high rates of suicide and homicide and the frequency with which they occur as antecedents in our report are striking."The stark revelation comes as ministers prepare to unveil radical legislation.New Action on Alcohol proposals will make it illegal for anyone under 21 to buy alcohol to take away, mirroring similar approaches in Sweden, Iceland and the US. However, 18-year-olds would continue to be served in pubs, bars and clubs.The proposals, expected to be made public tomorrow, include setting minimum prices for alcohol and banning three-for-two or buy-one-get-one-free deals.The Manchester study by the university National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People with Mental Illness is to be published today.
"There has been a welcome recent fall in the suicide rates among the general Scottish population but, despite this, the most striking feature of rates north of the border is how much higher they are than in England and Wales," Mr Appleby said.
"Similarly, the homicide rate in Scotland is substantially higher than in England and Wales."Unlike suicide rates, national homicide rates were boosted by concentrations in certain areas of the country, namely Glasgow and Argyll and Clyde.
The report found that, in common with England and Wales, homicide was a crime committed primarily by young men against young men, the weapon usually a knife.
"The rise in homicide rates in recent years is the result of an increase in killings by young people, mainly men under 25 years, but most are not mentally ill. Therefore, a public health approach to homicide would target alcohol and drug use before mental health illness," said Mr Appleby.
Of the 1373 patient suicides in the report, there was a history of alcohol misuse in 785 cases, an average of 131 deaths per year; a history of drug misuse was seen in 522 cases, or 87 deaths per year.
Of the 58 patient homicides, 41 had a history of alcohol abuse and 45 had drug misuse. Among all perpetrators, whether patients or not, drug and alcohol dependence were the most common diagnoses. In both suicide and homicide, most were not under the care of addiction services.
Meanwhile, a separate report out today highlights that Scotland's drinkers are failing to recognise they are consuming alcohol in quantities damaging to health.
The research by NHS Health Scotland found half the drinkers, who completed drinking diaries as part of the study, drank at least twice the recommended weekly drinking limit - 21 units for men and 14 units for women - and three-quarters reported at least one episode of binge drinking the previous week.
Although problem drinking was still strongly associated with deprivation, high levels of consumption among affluent and middle-aged groups were apparent.
Susan MacAskill, senior researcher from the Institute for Social Marketing at Stirling University and Open University, said: "When people were asked to itemise their drinking over the previous week, many were very surprised by how much they had really drunk."

Sweeping plans to toughen up community penalties and restore confidence in the criminal justice system will be published this week. Under the proposals, offenders serving community sentences could be required to wear jackets identifying that they are being punished for breaking the law. The plans have been drawn up by Louise Casey, former head of the Government's Respect Unit. The Guardian reported that while they appeared to have the backing of Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, some ministers close to PM Gordon Brown believed they were too punitive and would play to Conservative claims of a "broken society". Other measures were said to include the appointment of a public commissioner to represent victims of crime and giving police community support officers powers to detain and issue fixed penalty notices for disorder. Community punishments would be redesignated as "community payback" and responsibility for running them transferred from the probation service to a new organisation focused on punishment rather than rehabilitation. The courts service would be encouraged to set up websites to publicise convictions and sentences passed, while responsibility for publishing crime statistics would be taken away from Home Office ministers in order to restore credibility.
Officials however played down suggestions that the report would call for the publication of the "conviction posters" showing people who have been found guilty of a crime. Ms Casey was commissioned by Mr Brown to draw up the proposals after the Respect Unit was disbanded last year. A Cabinet Office spokesman confirmed the report was "due to be published shortly".

The Scottish government has "bold proposals to deal with the issue" of the "impact on crime and anti-social behaviour" of people drinking alcohol, which is reputedly "often cheaper than water" in some Scottish supermarkets.
(Where that leaves the stereotype of Scots as careful with money, I don't know. Why would they buy water from supermarkets rather than getting it near-free from a tap? Perhaps they are all drunk.)To solve the problem of cheap and plentiful products and consumers willing to consume them, it is proposed to institute minimum prices - with the enthusiastic support of specialist retailers, from whom the "cheaper than water" claim comes - and to raise the minimum age for buying alcohol to 21 in Scotland. The evidence that this will do anything to mitigate the alleged problems is, of course, lacking.Also in the absence of evidence, I have a prediction about the effect on crime of minimum prices and reduced availability for alcohol. Crime will go up. Not only will new criminal offences have been created, but since many will find it more difficult to get booze, some of them will steal it.

Misuse and Addictions Week, an awareness week supported by the home office runs from June 23-30th. During this week treatment agencies have an open door policy allowing addiction-treatment providers, referrers and commissioeinrs along with the general public to learn what services are available to them to help curb addiction. The awareness campaign coincides with the United Nations International Day Against Drug Abuse which is held on June 26th. The UN Office on Drugs & Crime launches this day every year to raise awareness.
Dan Butcher, founder of The Recovery Network (a social networking internet platform that provides real time education, a support network and social assistance to anyone affected by addiction) has been lobbying for some time now to have June 26th recognized as not only a global day of awareness but also UK Day against Drug Abuse. He's had several meeting in the house of Lords in order to achieve this goal. He hopes awareness campaigns such as these will help people to realise that it is an illness rather than a weakness. The Recovery Network launched on November 5th 2007 and the website currently helps to support an online community of over 2,000 registered members. Its members consist of addicts wishing to confront their addiction for the first time, recovering addicts and the friends and family members of both. Recovering Coke Addict and Founder Dan says: "This campaign is only one step in winning the war on addiction. The UK government needs to take a much more active role in supporting those affected by addiction. Millions of people have been affected either directly or indirectly by the devastating implications of drug addiction'. As well as tackling drugs and reducing drug-related crime in communities across the country, National Drugs Tackling Week will also highlight support services available such as The Recovery Network. Dan Butcher aims to create as much awareness as possible during this crucial week.

Brian Wright is being chased for £45million in profits from his billion-pound cocaine smuggling operation, a court heard.The 61-year-old godfather — who was known as The Milkman because he always delivered — is serving 30 years in jail after being convicted last year. In 2004 he was said to be worth £600m and prosecutors have this week been trying to claw back the proceeds of his crimes at Woolwich Crown Court.But Wright, who had a house in Frimley, claims he has no assets left. He is refusing to attend the hearing despite being brought from Whitemoor Prison in Cambridgeshire to the high-security Belmarsh jail in south London.His barrister Jerome Lynch QC told the court: “His position is he has nothing and no matter how much he says it, that will not be accepted.“Everything he paid for was paid for in cash and rented.“The approach the Crown has taken is so unrealistic that it is pointless engaging and he takes the view that it almost doesn’t matter.
“He is nearly 62 years of age, and is serving 30 years. He will not see the light of day.“One can understand a man of his age taking that approach when it is likely he will die in jail.”Mr Lynch said Wright’s wife died last year and added: “Is it really supposed that this man who allowed his wife to die in a rented apartment in Spain is the holder of £45million?’But Wright is refusing to give evidence in court to back up his claims he has no money left.“He has no intention of going into the witness box to give any further evidence other than that which he gave in the trial,” said Mr Lynch.
Brian Wright led a double life as a notorious horse-racing punter and a major league gangster before his arrest in Spain 2005.He rubbed shoulders with royalty, boasted a celebrity lifestyle.He laundered his drug money by making huge wagers on horse racing.Wright, married for 43 years, even boasted of meeting singer Frank Sinatra and film star Clint Eastwood.His wealth afforded him a house in Frimley, his rented luxury apartment in Chelsea Harbour, and a £2m villa — named El Lechero, the Spanish for The Milkman — in Spain.He had a box at the Royal Ascot race meeting for 14 years and was a member of the exclusive clubs Tramps and Annabels in London.
Wright was finally nailed by a Customs and Excise operation which began after a boat named Sea Mist was boarded by Irish Police at Cork Harbour on September 29, 1996.
Officers found 1,230lb of cocaine — valued at more than £50m — hidden in the dumb waiter of the yacht.The shipment was meant to have been smuggled into the UK and stored at a safe house in Lymington, Hampshire, but the gang fled the property after hearing of the arrest of the crew.Left at the house was Brian Wright’s Channel 4 Racing Diary containing contact numbers for other members of his cartel, as well as dozens of famous names in horse racing and TV. In 1997, police began bugging Wright’s exclusive riverside flat in Chelsea Harbour and following him and his friends, including right-hand man Kevin Hanley.The next year, as three more shipments successfully arrived in the UK via Poole, Dorset, and Salcombe, Devon, Wright was arrested over horse-fixing allegations.
He was released on bail and in December 1998 he left the UK for Spain after having a heart bypass operation.But on February 12, 1999, Wright’s son Brian Anthony Wright and son-in-law Paul Shannon were among 15 people arrested in connection with the smuggling investigation. Five days after his son’s arrest, Wright Snr paid £20,000 through his daughter Joanne for a private jet to take him and jockey Declan Murphy to Northern Cyprus.Because the territory had no extradition treaty with the UK, he was effectively safe from arrest until he moved on to Spain in 2002.
It was only in the spring of 2005 that Wright Snr was arrested in Marbella and flown back to Britain to face trial.The same year, police arrested Hanley’s girlfriend Anni Rowland for laundering drug money and found nearly £70,000 at her home in Great Burford, Oxfordshire.
Wright, whose last known address was in Cadiz, Spain, denied one count of conspiracy to evade the prohibition on the importation of a controlled substance and one count of conspiracy to supply drugs.
His only previous conviction is for dishonesty, obtaining property by deception, in the late 1970s.
Wright Jnr, now 40, of Ridgemount, Weybridge, Surrey, was found guilty of drugs importation and jailed for 16 years.
Paul Shannon, now 42, of Lockier Walk, Wembley, was found guilty of conspiracy to supply and jailed for five years.
The hearing continues.

If the dog thinks a person is carrying drugs they will sit next to them. Officers then have a power to search that person to look for drugs. One of the PANDA dogs scanned people waiting in queues for nightclubs and bars on Friday night.
Although there were no arrests made on this occasion it sent out a warning to revellers that police would be carrying out regular operations throughout the summer. Every weekend police put on additional patrols to meet the needs of Newcastle's popular social scene.City centre officers work closely with licensees and door staff every day of the week in an attempt to curtail disorder and the use of drugs. This operation was the first of a series of PANDA dog patrols which will continue throughout the summer.It's aimed at reinforcing the good work already being done by door supervisors who randomly search customers as a condition of entry into pubs and clubs. Over the past four months, more than 100 people have been arrested as a result of spot checks on entry by door supervisors and drugs including cocaine, heroin and amphetamine have been seized.
Neighbourhood Sergeant Claire Lawson said: "People who come to Newcastle just want to enjoy themselves and our job is to make sure they do just that.
"However, we won't tolerate the small percentage who bring drugs into the city centre, or whose bad behaviour starts to impact on other people's enjoyment, and the PANDA dog is one of many pro-active tactics we use. "We'd like to reassure people we are listening to their concerns and will continue to do all we can to tackle this issue so the city centre remains a safe and vibrant place for everyone to enjoy an evening out." The city centre becomes a popular venue during the summer for stag and hen parties, and also birthday celebrations. Sgt Lawson added: "It can be on these occasions when people may try drugs for the first time and it's those people we will catch out during these operations. Don't celebrate your birthday with a conviction.
"The city centre also has a successful Pubwatch scheme - where premises work together to share information instantly - which is supported by door staff.
"It demonstrates that by working closely with our partners and the community we can continue to be successful in reducing crime and disorder in Newcastle."

Dealers’ homes were targeted in police swoops after months of intelligence gathering by police.Nine targets were arrested and suspected drugs were seized in Operation Pembroke last September.Now, after the suspects have been dealt with by the courts over the past few months, police have revealed how their arrests have brought a drop in crime.The figures were given by Chester-le-Street community Insp Paul Anderson as he welcomed the last of the sentences handed out to people arrested during the operation.He said: “Since Operation Pembroke we have seen a sharp drop in crimes such as shoplifting, purse thefts and street robberies.“We believe most of these crimes were connected to the supply of drugs in the town.“In one incident an elderly woman suffered a broken arm during a robbery.”Insp Anderson said in August last year, before the raids, there were 352 crimes reported in the whole district, compared to 294 in October – a month after the arrests.In January this year there were 302 reported crimes, compared to 401 in January last year.
Eight people admitted being concerned with the supply of the Class A drug heroin, while a ninth admitted offering the drug.Sentences ranged from a nine-month suspended jail term to six years imprisonment.Durham Crown Court was told in February that Malcolm Pentland, 28, had allowed his house in the town’s Tuart Street to become a safe haven for drug taking and dealing.He was jailed for six years.
During Operation Pembroke, police recorded 217 visitors to the house, including regular visits by 20 known heroin users.
Undercover officers made 15 separate test purchases and were supplied £10 wraps of heroin.Last week Darren Turnbull, 23, of Arthur Street, High Handenhold, near Pelton, was given a 12-month jail sentence, suspended for two years with 100 hours of unpaid work.Kevin Watson, 48, of John Street, Beamish, was sentenced to serve 12 months, in addition to 138 days left from his last sentence.Richard Kaye, 25, of Windsor Terrace, Great Lumley, Chester-le-Street, was jailed for 12 months.
Insp Anderson said: “I am pleased with the sentences which have been handed out to criminals.“We are not resting on our laurels and want to reassure the community that we will act on all information that we receive.”

killing of Richard Petty over a mere £80 sheds a harsh light on the perils of Teesside’s drugs underworld, even at its lower levels. CCTV captured the murderers’ movements with chilling precision. Into the lift, up to the seventh floor, back down, then out - in four minutes.
CCTV captured the murderers’ movements with chilling precision. Into the lift, up to the seventh floor, back down, then out - in four minutes.“They had at the most 90 seconds in that flat,” says Detective Inspector Andy Greenwood, above, from Cleveland Police’s murder investigation team, who retraced their steps at the Melsonby Court flats.Mark ‘Peo’ Pearson and Joe Tingle were hardly sophisticated drugs kingpins living in high-rolling opulence.As heroin users themselves, they had advanced up the food chain to using at least one “lieutenant” to sell drugs for them and share the profits.But their savage execution of Richard Petty in his Billingham home between 2.36 and 2.40pm on March 25 was every bit as vicious and ruthlessly efficient as any gangland ‘hit’.With heroin and half a bottle of vodka inside him, Pearson walked silently into the living room and spoke to Mr Petty.Without giving him a chance to reply, Pearson was seen swiping and lunging at him with a large kitchen knife, twice thrusting the blade into his body up to the hilt.Richard Petty was left lying on his back, dying in a pool of blood with seven stab wounds, one into the heart.“It was a totally unprovoked attack on a man who was sitting in the living room of his flat, unprotected,” says Det Insp Greenwood.

Adam Greener was armed with a silver revolver when he got into a woman’s car at the junction of Roman Road and Rockliffe Road in Linthorpe and said, “Drive or I’ll shoot you.”Under the influence of drugs, he tried to snatch the driver’s handbag from the passenger seat of the Peugeot 206, which was stationary in traffic.Greener, 20, of Westbourne Road, Middlesbrough, admitted two charges at Teesside Crown Court yesterday.He pleaded guilty to attempting to rob 46-year-old mum Kay Cotton, from the Eston area, of her handbag on January 15, and possessing a firearm or imitation firearm with intent to commit robbery.Prosecutor Ian West said: “She describes going back to her car after going to the shop.“A man, the defendant, gets into the passenger seat of the car. He says, ‘Drive.’“When she doesn’t immediately do that, he produces this weapon and says, ‘Drive or I’ll shoot you.’“The defendant accepts what Mrs Cotton says he said when he got into the car.”The hooded raider fled empty-handed, while Mrs Cotton got out of the car and was shaken but not injured.She was taken into a nearby shop and given a cup of tea to calm her nerves until police arrived and sealed off the area in Roman Road.Greener had been accused of attempted kidnap, but the Crown are no longer proceeding with that charge because of his guilty pleas.He had no previous serious crimes which would classify him as a dangerous offender.But if it is discovered that he had a prohibited weapon, he could face a minimum sentence of five years in prison.It has still not been confirmed for certain whether the weapon, found in Mrs Cotton’s car, was an imitation or real firearm.“There were apparently bullets in the chambers of this revolver, but the barrel was blocked at the bridge,” Mr West told the court yesterday.It is not certain whether it could be adapted to fire a lethal missile, he added. Experts are to be consulted, and there may be a court hearing to decide the issue.
Peter Sabiston, defending, said Greener was under the influence of Class C drugs at the time.
The judge, Recorder Michael Slater, adjourned sentencing until April 11 for reports to be prepared on Greener, who was remanded in custody. The attack was described as an “isolated incident”.
But it prompted Cleveland Police to urge drivers to take extra care when stationary in built-up areas, to lock doors while travelling, sound horns if in danger and not to leave bags on seats or in footwells.

'Trauma, Drug Misuse and Transforming Identities: A Life Story Approach' by Professor Kim Etherington. Kim's book looks at the lives of ex-drug users told in their words. It illustrates the links between early childhood experiences and drug misuse, and also shows pathways to recovery and transformation.
The book illustrates how some people use drugs, in particular heroin, as a coping mechanism to help them deal with traumatic experiences in their childhood. Such trauma may have involved chronic parental neglect, physical and emotional abuse by parents, sexual abuse by a family member, rape by a stranger, or racial abuse and harassment.
Heroin and other opiates are used medically as analgesics to reduce physical pain, but they also alleviate psychological pain. It is not surprising that a traumatised person may use heroin as a coping mechanism and take up the heroin-using lifestyle. Becoming part of the heroin-using culture can also be of 'therapeutic value' because the person associates with other heroin users who may identify with their problems and past experiences. Some of these people will have had similar experiences.
Most non-drug users do not see beyond the heroin user stereotype - the 'dirty, devious, criminal junkie'. They do not stop to think that the heroin user may have experienced a traumatic childhood and have started along a path to addiction as a natural response to trying to deal with their resulting anguish and psychological pain. They did not set out to become an addict, and they very likely did not know the addictive potential of heroin and the heroin-using lifestyle.
These same non-drug users may have no problems at all with other people going to their doctor because they felt anxious or 'down' and being readily prescribed with anti-anxiety drugs (that are highly addictive) or anti-depressants. The distress these people are experiencing may be minimal compared to the heroin user described above and the necessity for prescribed drug use unjustified. However, the person wants to feel they are being 'treated', the doctor wants to keep the patient happy, and the drug company (which some people might argue is a legal drug dealer in certain circumstances) makes its profits.
We are in a hypocritical society which on the one hand demonises use of illegal drugs - without thinking about why these drugs might be used - whilst at the same time encouraging people to take legal prescribed drugs, which are in many cases more dangerous than legal drugs.
And we get bigoted comments like that reported to have been made by Tory MP David Davies last week - 'Taxpayers will be outraged that so much of their money is going to junkies and winos who will use the money simply to fund their disgusting habits.' Such people need to move past the end of their noses and get a dose of reality - assuming that they understand or care about problems experienced by other people. They must stop making naive and nasty generalisations.

Health expert has been charged with devising a strategy to reduce the financial toll of alcohol, drugs and cigarettes.Health Minister Nicola Roxon announced the establishment of the taskforce _ to be led by the professor of global health at the Nossal Institute of Global Health, Dr Rob Moodie _ as she released a report showing that in 2004-2005, the social cost of alcohol, tobacco use and illicit drugs was about $56 billion.Ms Roxon described the figures as "staggering''.
"That's an enormous amount of money and that's not just the health cost to individuals or to the health system, it's also the flow-on costs in terms of crime, lost productivity at work, people taking time off to care for others,'' she said.
"So it's a very detailed analysis and a reminder to us of why it's so important to focus on prevention.''
The taskforce has been charged with developing a National Preventative Health Strategy by June 2009, with a focus on tobacco, alcohol and obesity.
It will also provide interim recommendations to be included in the Australian Health Care Agreements between the commonwealth, states and territories in July this year.
Ms Roxon said Australia needed a long-term strategy to ease the cost on communities.
She said the time was ripe for a new approach.
"I think the time is right for there to be a real shift in community thinking about the way we handle some of our health problems,'' she said. "Health problems are not just about fixing hospitals, we actually have to fix some of the things that mean people end up in hospital.''
The Rudd Government has committed $68 million to programs to cut binge drinking by young people and smoking by indigenous Australians.
But while Treasury has been asked to report on the economic benefits of the focus on disease prevention, the Government's threat of a razor gang budget next month means funding for other initiatives is likely to be pushed out for another year.
The commonwealth spent almost $43 billion on health in 2007-08, about 18 per cent of its total expenditure.
But that pales next to the estimates detailed in the report Costs of Tobacco, Alcohol and Illicit Drug Abuse, prepared by David Collins of Macquarie University and Helen Lapsley of the universities of Queensland and NSW.
Cigarettes accounted for more than half the annual costs to the community in 2004-05, at $31.5 billion, including $15.5 billion in lost productivity.
Alcohol was the next biggest offender, racking up a bill of $15.3 billion, including $3.5 billion in lost productivity and $3.1billion in road accidents.
Illicit drug use had an $8.2billion toll, with almost half the costs due to crime.

Pete Doherty was jailed for 14 weeks yesterday after he admitted breaching a court order designed to cure his drug addiction. The Babyshambles frontman was expected to wake up in a cell in Wormwood Scrubs prison this morning after admitting missing appointments with the probation service.
His lawyer said tests as part of the order showed Doherty had still been using class A drugs. It is the longest spell he has faced in jail since 2003, when he was convicted of burglary. The sentence means Doherty will miss out on performing at the Glastonbury festival in June.

new ambition for all hostels to provide access to support, training and employment within the next three years to help end persistent rough sleeping, was announced today by Housing Minister Iain Wright. The Minister published an action plan to reduce rough sleeping to as close to zero as possible, with new measures to help those who have remained entrenched on the streets.
He announced a new aspiration for hostels to provide access to training and employment opportunities, supported by the £160 million the Government has put in place to refurbish hostels and improve their services by 2011. The Minister invited stakeholders involved in rough sleeping to join in the discussion on a package of measures to underpin the strategy, including:
* A renewed drive to identify and engage with the most persistent rough sleepers to get them off the streets and into a more stable environment, minimising the risk of falling back into old routines and old patterns of dependency. Groups such as older drinkers have historically been harder to reach and new models may be needed to get them in off the streets, such as personalised support.
* Universal access to skills programmes in hostels to develop an individual's talents and boost their confidence in stepping up and out of insecurity and dependency. The Government's £160 million investment in projects to reduce rough sleeping also includes an academy in London, which will provide former rough sleepers with opportunities to develop skills in areas of employment as diverse as restaurant management to cookery skills.
* A new London homeless taskforce, bringing together the Government, the voluntary sector and local authorities to better tackle rough sleeping. These key players will help to put the right solutions in place for people with complex needs, preventing them slipping through the net and back onto the streets. It will have a pan-London focus to effectively tackle rough sleeping across the capital.
* The provision of 500 units of private rented accommodation in London to enable those who are ready to move out of hostels, but still need some level of support, to live independently. This will free up hostel spaces for those coming in from the cold and help prevent hostels 'silting up' with those who are ready to make the next step.
* Increased working across government to ensure the one stop shops can provide tangible, practical support across a range of homeless issues. As well as providing skills the hostels will provide specific support for those in need, for example making sure that those with dependencies such as drugs or alcohol have access to the services they need.
Whilst huge progress has been made reducing the number of rough sleepers from 1,800 in 1997 to around 500 on any given night, the challenge now is help the remaining persistent rough sleepers make a permanent move away from the streets, especially in London. Some have been in a 'revolving door of homelessness' entering hostels dozens of times a year but coming back onto the streets only days later.

Just what is it about cannabis that makes certain politicians act so bizarrely and disconnect from reality is such spectacular fashion? And this is without even smoking it (although actually, most of them have). Moreover, there appears to be a sort of dose-response effect in evidence: The more senior they get, the more deranged they seem to become. Look at how Cameron has metamorphosed from a pragmatic backbencher and member of the Home Affairs Select Committee in 2001 calling for cannabis to be reclassified from B to C, into a classic reactionary-right drug warrior, now as party leader, calling for it to be moved back from C to B. And see how Gordon Brown, who never made a peep about drug policy before becoming PM, is now grabbing any opportunity to wheel out his new tough line advocating mass criminalisation of young cannabis users (no child left behind) as a way of asserting his prime-ministerial strength and moral fortitude. Rational thought, it appears, is the first casualty of a drug war.
As anyone who has been following the seemingly endless (we are now in year 7) cannabis reclassification shenanigans knows, last week Gordon Brown strongly implied that he planned to reclassify cannabis from C back to B regardless of what the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs recommends at the end of this month (but with all the serious money, and BBC leaks, on them calling for stay in C). In case you don’t know the ACMD are the 30 or so Government appointed scientists and experts from the drugs field who have recently completed their marathon 4-day literature review and public consultation on the B/C question.
Brown’s position on this question was echoed by another recent example of how politics and emotive anecdote are trumping rationality, pragmatism and science; a Daily Telegraph op-ed last week with the willfully ignorant headline (seeming to almost revel in the idea of bad science led policy making):

Old Firm sponsor Carling is to remove its logo from Rangers and Celtic children's football tops in a bid to promote responsible drinking. The move comes two years ahead of an agreed ban by the drinks industry on branding on child-size replica shirts. But an alcohol concern group has called for a total ban on alcohol sponsorship in sport. The Scottish Football Association (SFA) said a wider debate on the issue of alcohol branding in sport was needed. Carling, brewed by Coors, has sponsored Rangers and Celtic since 2003. Until now replica kits for children have been available without branding but these will become standard from next season. Jack Law, from Alcohol Focus Scotland, said he supported the move but called for a total ban. He said: "Why should fans, young or old, be exposed to so much alcohol advertising when they watch a match? "We would say that alcohol sponsorship in sport is inappropriate. "Footballers don't drink alcohol before a match to ensure peak fitness, but during the match itself they wear a top with an alcoholic drink logo on it. Alcohol and high performance do not go hand in hand."

Police confiscated 44,000 pints of alcoholic drinks during a crackdown on under-age drinking in February. The 25,000 litres of drinks - mainly beer and cider - were seized during a two-week operation involving 39 forces in England and Wales.
It was the largest ever enforcement operation of its kind, with alcohol seized from more than 5,000 youths. The Home Office said information from the £700,000 operation would help target individuals and trouble spots. Seventy per cent of the drink seized was beer, 15 % cider, 5% alcopops, 5% wine and 5% spirits.
When police asked the under-age drinkers where the alcohol came from, 70% refused to say, while of the remaining 30% half said they got the drink from a shop.

The Centre for Policy Studies today announces the establishment of a specialist Prison and Addiction Unit (PandA).Remit
PandA’s aim is to challenge the Government’s fundamentally flawed drug policy.
It will scrutinise this rapidly expanding but largely unmonitored area of government intervention. PandA will advocate restricting the supply of drugs; and the provision of effective treatment to help those suffering from addiction to make a full recovery. Neither of these aims are being achieved by current government policy (despite claims to the contrary).In the words of PandA member Professor Neil Mckeganey (Professor of Drug Misuse Research. University of Glasgow):
"I believe nothing short of a revolution in drug abuse treatment in the UK is required. This must recognize the unparalleled harms of illegal drug use and addiction and must focus first and foremost on getting addicts off drugs."
PandA will study all aspects of drugs and alcohol supply, treatment policy, prevention and education in the UK. Key themes it will consider include:
- the centralisation of the management of treatment and why it is wrong
- the new prisons ‘integrated drugs treatment strategy’ and its dangers
- the effective, as opposed to ineffective, treatment of addiction
- the liberalisation of the control of supply of drugs and alcohol and its damaging consequences
- the national ‘harm reduction’ drugs education programme and its implications and consequences
- what a prevention policy could look like
Membership of PandA
Kathy Gyngell (Chair)
Mary Brett (Drugs Education Consultant, UK Representative EURAD)
Chris Cook (Professorial Research Fellow, Department of Theology and Religion, Durham University, formerly Professor of the Psychiatry Of Alcohol Misuse , University of Kent)
Huseyin Djemil (former London Area Drugs Strategy Coordinator, HM Prison Service, Consultant – Drug Strategy, Operations and Research)
Andy Horwood (former Drugs Action Team Coordinator for Bedfordshire and Luton)
James Langton (Founder of The Clearhead Recovery Programme)
Neil McKeganey (Professor of Drug Misuse Research. University of Glasgow)
Michelle Tempest (Psychiatrist, Addenbrokes Hospital, Cambridge)
David Partington (General Secretary, International Substance Abuse and Addiction Centre ISAAC)
Dr K A H Mirza (Consultant to the group)
All members serve in a personal capacity. The views expressed in its publications and announcements are the sole responsibility of the authors. Contributions are chosen for their value in informing public debate and should not be taken as representing a corporate view of the CPS or of PandA.
Comment
Members of PandA are available for comment on all aspects of government prison and addiction policy. Enquiries should be sent to Kathy Gyngell at Kathy@gyngell.me.uk. Kathy can be contacted directly on 020 7351 6612

Who could fail to disagree with the sentiments behind the government’s revised drug strategy (Drugs: Protecting Families and Communities, 2008 -2018 Strategy, Home Office, 27 February 2008)? Strengthening communities, working together, “a clear commitment to meet the needs of all our diverse communities”, and “preventing harm to children, young people and families affected by drug misuse” are hardly controversial. But does this report avoid controversy because, like its predecessors, it lacks direction, critical reflection, and a fundamental understanding of the complex problem at hand?
In fact this new strategy is even more all-encompassing, woolly and vague. Instead of challenging the incompatibility of addicts’ wants – of their aspirations for normalcy along with continuing drug dependency (whether on licit or illicit drugs) – the Government continues to ask us to suspend disbelief and to muddy the waters of policy by asserting that it has met, is meeting and managing this incompatible demand.
Unsurprisingly then the strategy document fails to look critically at the treatment system of its own creation, one that is overburdened by bureaucracy but undermanned in terms of real skill and knowledge in relation to treatment.

Strange and outrageous chemicals

DMT Dimethyltryptamine

Found in minute quantities in certain Amazonian plants and in the human brain. Smoked, the effects are nearly instantaneous and very strange. "The closest you'll get to experiencing death bar actually dying" as one user put it.

Dose 2-60mg
Duration Less than 10 minutes
Legal status Class A
Price £100 a gram on the street


5-Meo-DMT Methoxydimethyltryptamine

A more powerful sister compound of DMT, occurring naturally in the venom of the Bufo alvarius toad but generally smoked in synthesised form. Not uncommon for those who take large amounts to suffer psychological and emotional difficulties for weeks afterwards.

Dose 1-20mg (smaller than a grain of salt)
Duration 5-20 minutes
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $175 (about £90) a gram


2C-I (2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodophenethylamine)

Most likely candidate for the coveted title "the next ecstasy".

Powerful psychedelic stimulant described as a cross between MDMA and LSD but with much gentler side-effects. Already appearing in pill form on the UK dance scene.

Dose 10-25mg
Duration 5-8 hours
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $299 a gram web price; £10 a pill on the street

2-CT-2 (2,5-dimethyoxy-4-ethylthiophenethylamine)

Respected psychedelic, from the same phenethylamine family as MDMA and mescaline.

Noted for its warmth and "outrageous visuals".

Dose 10-25mg
Duration 5-8 hours
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $299 a gram web price; £10 a pill on the street
The majority of these new drugs are powerful synthetic psychedelics from the same chemical families as LSD, magic mushrooms and mescaline. They are too new to have enticing street names; instead their lengthy chemical names are shortened to abbreviations such as 2C-I, 4-HO-DiPT, and 5-Meo-DMT. Unlike ecstasy, methamphetamine or other synthetic recreational drugs, the new compounds are not made in illicit factories or backroom kitchen laboratories. Instead, "research chemicals", as they are euphemistically known, are synthesised by commercial labs, often based in the US, which openly sell their products on the internet.
The rapid growth in the transatlantic online trade in such chemicals has been fuelled by international differences over legality. While Britain has outlawed all of these drugs - under an amendment to the Misuse Of Drugs Act in February 2002 - they remain legal in most other countries, including the majority of EU member states. Even in the US, despite some of the most draconian anti-drug laws in the world, the bulk of research chemicals are legal to manufacture, sell, possess and consume. With ecstasy dropping in price and popularity, users and dealers in this country are looking further afield to obtain new highs. A recent Home Office survey found that ecstasy use had dropped 21% in the last year. The street price had also dropped to an all time low of £2-£3 a pill. But while most research chemicals are too psychedelically powerful to make it as club drugs, one, 2C-I, is rapidly gaining popularity in this country as a dance drug, thanks to some similarities in effect to MDMA, the main ingredient of ecstasy. More than 125 pills of the drug were seized by police last year, including 65 at the Glastonbury festival, and some London dealers are offering it for £10 a tablet. British police acknowledge that the internet drugs trade is a growing problem. "It is one of our key priorities," a spokeswoman for the National Hi-Tech Crime Unit, responsible for policing internet crime, told the Guardian. "Supply of class As is one of the areas we are examining."
Most research chemicals come as crystalline white powder. They can be swallowed, snorted, smoked or injected. Some users prefer to administer them via enema.
Psychedelic stimulants such as 2C-I and 2-CT-2 induce visual hallucinations, energy surges, and euphoria. The most powerful is 5-Meo-DMT, doses of which are smaller than a grain of salt. When smoked, its effects are nearly instantaneous, propelling the user into an alternate reality, described as like "being shot out of the nozzle of an atomic cannon". The experience lasts 10 minutes.
Online drug trading is becoming an increasingly competitive and sophisticated industry. Last month, the Guardian revealed that at least five British websites were selling cannabis online. The leading research chemical sites compete openly to offer the purest product, the best customer service, the fastest deliveries and the lowest prices. Sophisticated e-commerce technology, electronic payment systems and next day courier services guarantee swift, effortless "one-click" transactions. Most sites offer between five and 15 different drugs, with prices ranging from $95 to $350 (about £50-£185) a gram excluding delivery. The maximum order is 5g. Customers must be over 21.
Credit cards and international money orders are accepted. Drugs like 2C-I can be shipped, via UPS or Fedex, worldwide. Next day delivery is often guaranteed. Most will ship to the UK and other EU states with one caveat: "All purchasers are responsible for compliance with any applicable city, county, state, federal or national regulations related to the purchase, possession and use of any and/or all product," reads the disclaimer on one site.
"It's very easy to get them if you know where to go and you're prepared to take the risk," said Charlie, 34, a photographer and graphic designer from south London. He calls himself a regular customer of a research chemicals company based in New York.
Every three months he buys a selection using his credit card. It usually takes three days to arrive via UPS Express. Most recently he made a repeat-order for 1g of 2,5-dimethyoxy-4-ethylthiophenethylamine (or 2-CT-2 for short), a class A psychedelic similar in effect to mescaline. It costs $175 excluding delivery.
"It's pure. You know exactly what you're getting," he said.
Research chemicals are advertised online as 99% lab pure, but experts warn that that does not mean they are safe. Compared with similar drugs like LSD and magic mushrooms, which have undergone decades of informal human experimentation with relatively few direct fatalities, research chemicals are unknowns. Few human or animal toxicity studies have been carried out. Even their proponents are at pains to point out the unpredictability and danger involved in reckless experimentation. "It is not reasonable to assume that these chemicals are in any way 'safe' to use recreationally," states the FAQ at erowid.org, the internet's biggest underground drug resource. "When you take a research chemical, you are stepping out into the unknown, and you could be the unfortunate person to discover a new drug's lethal dose." Safety is a big issue among avid users of research chemicals. Detailed "trip reports" and harm reduction tips are shared through an extensive network of websites and bulletin boards. First time users are expected to read up on their drug of choice and start with small amounts. Nevertheless, with active doses running to hundredths or even thousandths of a gram, overdoses triggering unexpected reactions can be a very real threat, even with electronic scales sensitive to these weights. In October 2000, Jake Duroy, 20, from Oklahoma, snorted 35mg of a research psychedelic called 2-CT-7 he had ordered from the web. He was an experienced user but this was a massive amount of the drug to take nasally, which can greatly amplify the effect. He quickly became agitated and violent and two hours later died of a heart attack.
In April the following year, a 17-year-old died after snorting a similar amount of the same drug. A year later in July 2002, 2-CT-7 was emergency-scheduled by the US Drug Enforcement Agency. In their statement, they cited information from trip reports on the internet. After these tragedies, 2-CT-7 was removed from the online marketplace and has not reappeared.
The EU recently recommended that member states ban 2C-I as a matter of urgency, although they turned up no evidence of large scale manufacture. The police, however, were quick to sound the alarm. "The chemicals to make this are available and it can be made pretty much anywhere," a source said.
Most research chemicals were invented by one man, Californian biochemist Dr Alexander Shulgin, 78. As an expert witness and adviser to the US Drug Enforcement Agency, he held a licence permitting him to study psychoactive drugs. Over decades, he created hundreds of new mind-altering compounds and then tested them on himself and a small coterie of fellow "psychonauts". The recipes for more than 170 of his materials were published in two biochemical cookbooks in the 1990s and now form the backbone of the research chemicals industry.
Despite the risks, Charlie is prepared to order again, although he admits he gets nervous every time. "I track them via the delivery company's website and can watch when they pass through customs safely," he said. "Then I know I can relax."

The report is expected to be highly critical of how little is known is about the effectiveness of drug treatment programmes in prisons, despite a £330m investment by government, as no evaluations have been conducted to establish whether drug-free wings and programmes based on cognitive behavioural therapy work.A new report from the Drug Policy Commission, an independent panel, says as many as 65,000 prisoners in England and Wales are thought to be problem drug users and two-thirds of these are convicted for the less serious crimes of shoplifting and burglary. The commission believes these offenders should not be jailed and suggests community treatment programmes would be more effective than prison.
Almost a third of heroin and crack users arrested admit to committing an average of one crime a day, but the Commission is concerned that drug treatment programmes in prisons have failed.
The commission’s report is highly critical of the quality of treatment in jails, where “provision often falls short of even minimum standards and is a major concern for the health and well-being of prisoners and the subsequent impact on crime”.
The commission says not only have they not worked but inmates are at risk of infection from blood-borne viruses.In excess of £330m is spent in England and Wales on treating offenders annually and the commission says some treatment services such as the Carat service, risked doing more harm than good; the Carat service took on 78,000 new prisoners last year.
The commission has found for the 40,000 prisoners who go through ‘detox’ while in jail, a lack of proper aftercare meant many went straight back to using hard drugs when they left prison and 1 in 200 injecting heroin users would be dead from an overdose within a fortnight of being released.
The problem of drug use in prison is an increasing one and research has revealed that heroin use is now more widespread than cannabis.
A £175m Drugs Intervention Programme treated 40,000 offenders in the community last year and within six months, 47% had reduced their offending, but 28% had increased.
The commission says the prison population is at a record high of nearly 82,000, and pressures have created an environment unlikely to be “conducive to recovery”.
The British Medical Association says the prison system lacked a “comprehensive care package” from when someone entered the custodial chain to when they were released and the BMA supports community treatment as an alternative to a prison sentence

The number of drug-related deaths in Scotland has increased by a quarter, according to new figures. The General Register Office for Scotland (Gros) said there were 421 drug-related deaths last year, 85 more than in 2005, representing a 25% rise. Heroin or morphine use was involved in 62% of the deaths, while methadone use accounted for 23% of the total. The statistics revealed that 83% of those who died were under the age of 45, with 16% under 25. Almost four-fifths - 79% - of the fatalities were men. Previously the highest ever number of drug deaths recorded in Scotland occurred in 2002 when 392 people died. According to Gros, 280 of the deaths were a direct result of drug abuse, 51 were caused by accidental poisoning and 40 by intentional self poisoning. Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said a new strategy was needed to tackle the demand and supply of illicit drugs in Scotland. A 25% increase in fatalities in just one year is extremely concerning and presents a disturbing report card of Scotland's overall drugs problem
He said: "This tragic death toll highlights the true scale of the challenge we are facing - a 25% increase in fatalities in just one year is extremely concerning and presents a disturbing report card of Scotland's overall drugs problem. "Our new strategy must tackle demand as well as supply and we will place renewed focus on education, tough enforcement, and of course new emphasis on diversion and prevention by offering more young people opportunities in sports and the arts to build self-esteem." The Scottish Conservatives called the figures "deeply depressing and chilling".
'Zero-tolerance' Party leader, Annabel Goldie said: "We need a clearer strategy which rehabilitates those caught up in a life of drugs and helps them on the way to abstinence, whilst at the same time adopting a zero-tolerance attitude to drugs and especially towards drug dealers.
Labour's Hugh Henry also acknowledged that a radical rethink was required. He added: "If the issue is about more resources then Labour will back the executive if it wants to make more money available. "But I suspect this is about more than just money and what is really needed is a radical rethink by experts working in the field." The Liberal Democrats called the figures "very worrying indeed". "There also needs to be a renewed effort against drug dealers, large and small, to get them off our streets", said the party's health spokesman, Ross Finnie. 'Terrible menace' figures did show a reduction in the number of deaths associated with cocaine and diazepam use. In 2005, 44 people died after taking cocaine. That figure dropped to 33 last year.
Deaths from diazepam, which is associated with the abuse of other substances like heroin, peaked in 2002 but have since reduced. The drug claimed 78 lives last year.
The highest proportion of deaths occurred in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS Board area, with 162 people dying through drug misuse, up 51 on the previous year.
In Grampian, 47 people died last year, up 24 on 2005's figures, while in Lothian the figure for drug-related deaths was 46.
These larger totals, however, include cases of accidental poisoning, deliberate self-poisoning, and cases where the victim's intention was unknown.
Graeme Pearson, director general of the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency and the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpos) spokesman on drugs, said the organisation was continuously looking for opportunities to reduce drug deaths.
He added: "The Scottish Executive policy of health, education and law enforcement is the best way to try and tackle the terrible menace of drugs that blights Scotland."

A shocking report found Gwynedd and Anglesey had the highest rate of deaths per population in Wales last year, with eight out of 100,000 killed by drugs.It puts the region’s drug deaths on a par with Liverpool.Swansea had seven deaths per 100,000, and Ceredigion three. Powys had three in 2005 and one last year.The figures emerged in a report by the International Centre for Drug Policy at the University of London.North West Wales coroner Dewi Pritchard Jones said: “What’s shocking is the number of drug deaths coming in. At one time they were few and far between.”Mr Pritchard Jones, a member of the North Wales Drug Forum, said: “There have been drug-related deaths in Llandudno and Menai Bridge for years but what’s happening now is that there are more in places such as Denbigh, Holyhead, Bangor, Penygroes and Pwllheli. It has now spread to rural areas.”Mr Pritchard Jones said steps had been taken to ensure addicts took prescribed methadone in view of chemists in pharmacies, but in rural areas this was difficult to control.He said: “We are running a campaign that users must consume it within the pharmacy. That’s running well in towns like Colwyn Bay, Bangor and Holyhead but not in the countryside because it isn’t easy for people to get to a pharmacy twice a day.”Maldwyn Roberts, North Wales co-ordinator for community safety and substance misuse, and chairman of the Drug Related Death Review Group, said: “Usually heroin on its own does not kill but heroin is connected with most deaths.“Used with other drugs or alcohol it leaves users having trouble breathing or vomiting or drowning on the contents of their stomach.”Mr Roberts said many of the drug deaths were users who had decided not to get help from agencies and had taken drugs while on their own.The Cais drugs advisory service chief, Aneurin Owen, said: “The need for effective treatment is paramount if we are to reduce drug related deaths. Treatment has to be comprehensive, including more in-patient de-tox and better follow-up links in the community.”Carol Moore, chief officer of North Wales Probation Service said:“We have six substance misuse action teams at local authority level bringing together the police, probation, health and organisations involved in front-line substance misuse.“In addition we have the drug intervention programme funded by the Welsh Assembly Government and which delivers a range of services to people who have committed offences connected with drug misuse and at-risk groups.“Within the Probation Service we are able to offer a drug rehabilitation requirement as part of a community sentence for anybody who is going through the courts where drugs or substance misuse is a problem linked to their offending.”Caernarfon Plaid Cymru MP Hywel Williams said: “It is a particular problem in rural areas because people are isolated.”Figures for North East Wales and central North Wales were not supplied.
A recent study carried out by a group of experts from North Wales and London concluded that “the prevalence of may be rising.”Out of a population of around 250,000, researchers found an approximate total of 820 heroin users aged between 15-44 living in North west Wales, almost 1.2% of the population.However they estimated that the total number of users in the area to be much higher at aroheroin use in North west Walesund 1,300.One expert said the heroin problem in rural North west Wales was the same as Brighton.The study said: “The prevalence of heroin use in North West Wales is comparable to that reported from urban areas of the UK.”The study pointed to “pockets of high social deprivation and an established heroin-using population.”The experts analysed police custody figures, opiate-related overdose figures and hospital admissions. They also took data from hepatitis C tests.Out of 322 observed heroin users 72% were male, and 60% aged under 30.

A significant proportion of parents are currently unaware of the prevalence of substance abuse amongst children and teenagers. Based upon the statistics, prevention is clearly the key here, but often parents delay the discussion of drug abuse issues with their children, unfortunately assuming that they won’t be exposed to drugs until they are older. As the statistics below demonstrate, drug abuse can often occur very early on in today’s drug abuse and binge drinking culture. So please don’t make the common mistake of putting off your discussion about drug and alcohol awareness with your children. 9% of 13 year olds and over a quarter (27%) of 15 year olds reported that they had used an illicit drug at some point in their lives. 7% of 13 year olds and 23% of 15 year olds reported that they had used an illicit drug in the year prior to the survey.4% of 13 year olds and 14% of 15 year olds reported that they had abused an illegal drug in the month prior to the survey which is perhaps indicative of more frequent recreational drug use.
There was only minor difference between boys and girls in the statistics of those who reported that they had used illegal drugs in the last month (13 year olds, boys 4%, girls 3%: 15 year olds, boys 14%, girls 12%). 4% of 15 year olds admitted abusing illegal drugs at least once per week (including those reporting use on most days). An additional 4% of 15 year olds reported that they often abused illegal drugs once or twice per month and 4% a few times a year.

Just over a third of deaths on UK roads are now young people aged 25 or under, so this is without doubt a serious problem. This equates to the death or serious injury of a young motorist or passenger every hour on average across the United Kingdom.

A detailed survey of over 8000 young motorists (aged from 17 to 24) carried out by Auto Trader, which is a UK motoring magazine and website, showed a frightening trend towards driving under the influence of either drugs, drink or both.In today's drug abuse and binge drinking culture amongst young adults and teenagers it is unfortunately no surprise that the statistics are high. In fact, as many as 17% of the young motorists surveyed admitted regular use of Cannabis, more alarmingly 12% frequently use the dangerous and addictive class A drug Cocaine, and 10% revealed regular use of Ecstasy. However, the greater danger comes from upwards of 10% admitting that they regularly drove their cars whilst under the influence of drink or drugs.When questioned about driving under the influence of substances, over 40% felt fine to drive their vehicles after using illegal drugs and 31% found it acceptable to drive after consuming alcohol. A high proportion were unaware of the actual legal limits for alcohol consumption when driving and as a result 8% had already been involved in an accident while under the influence, with a further 11% admitting a near miss.

Inverclyde men are four times more likely to die of drink than the average UK male.Government figures show the area now ranks second in the country for male alcohol-related death. Only Glasgow has a worse record and the latest figures from the Office of National Statistics show the problem is continuing to rise.
Greenock and Inverclyde MSP Duncan McNeil said the area is reaping the grim consequences of generations of alcohol addiction.
He said: “There’s no quick fix. What we’re dealing with is 20 years of alcohol addiction.
“The consequences of our unhealthy relationship with drink are with us — violence on our streets, underage drinking and binge-drinking. It’s still going on and we have to face up to it.”
But he added that there is hope for the future: “We’ve seen that with smoking going down that part of that battle was government action, but it was also that smoking became less socially acceptable.
“Once people come to the opinion that is’s unacceptable to drink and shout and bawl and fight in the street, that is part of the process of solving the problem.”
Pub landlord and Inverclyde health campaigner Ciano Rebecchi says cheap booze and a culture of drinking in Inverclyde is to blame for the current situation.
But he says the Government also needs to do more to help Inverclyde escape its drink death sentence.
Councillor Rebecchi said: “Government keeps telling us what they’re doing about it but what have they done?
“They talk about putting the price of drink up but people still buy it.
“We have got to change the culture here as well, and we got to educate as well.
“The first thing we’ve got to do is make drink is not being sold cheaply.
“We’re in a situation where here in Inverclyde you can by a can of strong drink cheaper than bottled water. That has got to change.”
Inverclyde Council’s alcohol service say action is already being taken to tackle booze addiction.
A spokesperson said: “Through Social Work, we have a dedicated alcohol team that works tirelessly in the community to offer support to those who need it. Since last year they have achieved two COSLA awards for their efforts and held a successful community event in November to raise awareness about addiction.
“We obviously want a healthier Inverclyde and hope more local people realise that help and support for alcohol related problems is available.
Through Inverclyde Alcohol and Drug Forum we will continue to work with partners on this key issue and we would urge those who need support to contact our alcohol service on 715812/3.”
Women in Inverclyde fare slightly better in the booze league of shame. Whilst the area has the second highest level of drink related death in men, the area is the fourth worst for female related death.

Three London councils - Westminster, Islington and Camden - have combined to set up the initiative, which will sit at the Inner London Family Proceedings Court.
The three-year pilot will cost more than £1.3m, with just under £900,000 coming from central government and the rest from the three boroughs.
The focus will very much be on therapy and recovery and so therefore on the longer-term interest of the child
Currently two-thirds of children taken into care in inner London have parents with drug or alcohol problems.
Justice minister Bridget Prentice said: "Cases will be brought to court earlier wherever a parent is suspected of substance or alcohol abuse.
"And during the course of the case, the focus will very much be on therapy and recovery and so therefore on the longer-term interest of the child."
She added: "If we can take a step towards ending the misery drugs and alcohol abuse causes families, that can only be a good thing."
The concept of the court is American and relies on swift and co-ordinated action from drug experts, social workers and housing professionals.
The judge could order parents to attend one-to-one counselling or group sessions to avoid having their kids taken into care.
Specialist district judge Nick Crichton, who has campaigned for such a court for the past five years, said: "We are confident that the pilot court will be able to make a significant difference to the lives of the children whose cases will come before us, and we are excited that at last the project is about to start."
He said the court would not focus solely on detoxifying the parent, but seek at the same time to understand the other problems that could be contributing to their situation.
These could include abusive relationships, debt, mental health problems, learning difficulties, and housing issues.
The court could recommend visits to the housing department, Alcoholics Anonymous sessions, and even advise ending abusive relationships.
"To some extent we might have to be uncomfortably directive," Judge Crichton said.
Parents' progress will be monitored by the same judge every two to four weeks - a point emphasised by Judge Crichton as key to the pilot's success.
In the US, the courts have a high success rate of keeping children with their parents after they have received help.
Westminster councillor Sarah Richardson said: "This new court process will give us the chance to intervene and support the family unit rather than take it apart, by helping parents through treatments and recovery.
"This, we hope, will keep both the child safe and the family together."
The project will be evaluated by experts from Brunel University to see if parents on its programme are more successful in tackling their substance abuse.
It will also monitor whether children of addict parents can safely remain at home, or if the scheme helps youngsters in care be returned to their parents.
Judith Harwin, professor of social work at Brunel University, said there were two problems with the existing policy of dealing with addictive parents.
In cases of illegal drug use, such as crack or heroin, authorities had "far too speedy a response" to remove the child before "parents have a chance to show whether they can address their problems".
In other cases, such as alcohol abuse, the case comes to court "far too late". The child can already be suffering from neglect and is more difficult to place with an alternative family.
"This means the child may drift in care for a long time", which could have poor outcomes for their future education, health and employment prospects, Professor Harwin said.

The UK's first family drug and alcohol court is due to open in London today.
The court, based on a US model, will hear childcare cases where one or both parents suffer from an addiction to alcohol or narcotics.
The new venture will hear family cases - such as child care applications - from three London councils - Westminster, Islington and Camden. A specialist judge will work with addiction specialists and social workers at the Family Drug and Alcohol Court, fast-tracking addicted parents into treatment and recovery programmes.
The three-year pilot, set up as a joint initiative by the three councils, will cost more than £1.3m, with just under £900,000 coming from central government and the rest from the three boroughs.
Currently, two-thirds of children taken into care in inner London have parents with drug or alcohol problems.
Justice minister Bridget Prentice said: "Cases will be brought to court earlier wherever a parent is suspected of substance or alcohol abuse.
"And during the course of the case, the focus will very much be on therapy and recovery and so therefore on the longer-term interest of the child."
She added: "If we can take a step towards ending the misery drugs and alcohol abuse causes families, that can only be a good thing."
The judge will be able to order parents to attend one-to-one counselling or group sessions to avoid having children taken into care.
The court may also recommend that a parent ends an abusive relationship or can advise them to visit a housing department or attend AA meetings.
Specialist district judge Nick Crichton, who has campaigned for such a court for the past five years, said: "We are confident that the pilot court will be able to make a significant difference to the lives of the children whose cases will come before us, and we are excited that at last the project is about to start."
Parents' progress will be monitored by the same judge every two to four weeks - a point emphasised by Judge Crichton as key to the pilot's success.
The project will be evaluated by experts from Brunel University

In a search for what could be the ultimate cure for drug addiction, scientists have developed a vaccine which prevents the body from getting high.
The hope is that it can stop people from falling back into a spiral of addiction if they have a relapse.
The most promising results so far have been with cocaine, but researchers hope it could also one day be used to cure addiction to methamphetamine, heroin and even cigarettes.
"The vaccine slowly decreases the amount of cocaine that reaches the brain," said Thomas Kosten, a professor of psychiatry and neuroscience at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, who has been working on the vaccine since 1995.
"It's a slow process, and patients do not go through any significant withdrawal symptoms."
The vaccine works by getting the body's immune system to recognize the drug as foreign and attack it in the blood stream.
It does so by injecting an altered version of the drug into the body which has been attached to a protein that the body will recognize as a threat.
"The body then says, 'This is a foreign article. I should start making antibodies to it,'" Kosten said in a telephone interview.
The cocaine molecules eventually pass through the kidneys and are excreted through the urine.
That stops the drug from reaching the brain and producing a sought-after high.
Use of the vaccine would lead to a gradual tapering of dependence, Kosten said.
"Gradually, antibody levels would rise. If you kept using (cocaine), you'd get less and less of an effect."
Of all the drugs tested, cocaine is the easiest one for which to develop a vaccine because of an enzyme in the bloodstream, cholinesterase, that helps break it down, Kosten said.
He has also begun to test vaccines for methamphetamine and heroin in animal studies, and hopes to eventually add nicotine to the list.
"That's going to be the moneymaker," he said.
The injections are designed for therapeutic -- not for preventative -- use, and are meant for those already suffering from addiction.
That, however, does not rule out other possible future uses, Kosten said.
"You could potentially inject pregnant cocaine users with the vaccine to prevent their fetuses from becoming contaminated," he explained.
Other uses could include administering the vaccine to high-risk adolescents in order to prevent them from becoming addicted early on, he said, while acknowledging that this would raise serious ethical and legal questions.
Testing for the cocaine vaccine has included a series of five injections over a period of three months, Kosten said.
The vaccine has one more large scale human study scheduled before it is ready for the federal Food and Drug Administration approval process.
A similar nicotine vaccine is also in the early stages of testing by several groups of European researchers. Kosten hopes to have the vaccine on the market in two to three years.

Instead of sentences, Mercer County Circuit Court Judge William Sadler handed down diplomas and new leases on life Monday.
The judge and a crowded courtroom of supporters gathered to wish seven graduates of the Southern Regional Drug Court well on their way into new, drug-free journeys, and two of the special speakers know what it’s like to travel the same roads.
Melissa Tedder was one of the first to complete the Mercer County program designed to provide alternative sentencing designed to help drug offenders overcome addiction and escape time behind bars. At the time she entered the program, Tedder didn’t have much to smile about and even fewer opportunities in her outlook.
“I was a menace to society. My life had fallen apart as a result of my drug addiction,” she said Monday.
This week, she couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across her face as she told the audience how her life had turned around since she entered the program and graduated in June 2007. In fact, she’s getting married soon. She’s held a job for 18 months straight, and she’s worked hard to repair relationships with her children and her mother.
Though she did the recovery work herself, she said it never would have been possible without the court’s strict supervision and the support of the drug court treatment team.
“I’ll always be grateful for this program,” she said.
Kenneth Shrader, another graduate, said he carries many titles. He’s a father, a husband, an employee and more. A couple of years ago, there were some other names he called himself.
“I was hopeless. I was an addict,” he said.
Shrader said his family and everyone who cared about him had given up, but there was one chance left. He was referred and accepted to the drug court docket, and today, he’s sober and once more surrounded by a family who knows he is strong enough to beat addiction.
Holding his new baby and watching his daughter in the audience, he said those relationships showcase the biggest differences in his life.
“Today, I remember a 4-year-old who didn’t want to leave her mommy’s leg, and now comes running to her daddy at the door,” he said.
Magistrate Mike Flanigan, who oversees the misdemeanor segment of the Southern Regional Drug Court along with Magistrate Rick Fowler, hosted Monday’s ceremony and reminded the seven graduates that the celebration was not a conclusion.
“It’s not the end, only the beginning,” he said.
Though Sadler said he was a skeptic when Circuit Court Judge Derek Swope approached him about a drug court, he said he became a believer as a team of community corrections officials began touring similar courts and making plans for their own in late 2004 and early 2005.
“We saw what drug court was truly about ... It was truly about helping people with addiction problems,” he said, along with relieving the court system of non-violent drug offenders and the expenses associated with incarcerating non-violent offenders.
It costs approximately $25,000 a year to incarcerate someone, and Mercer County has struggled to tame its bills to the Southern Regional Jail in Beaver. Participants in Monday’s graduation said the drug court not only saves money in jail fees; they said it spends treatment dollars more wisely.
In addition, drug court participants are expected to submit to drug testing, complete treatment goals, hold down jobs and give back to the communities in which they were once burdens.
Drug Court Coordinator Laura Helton said the 78 participants accepted so far have completed more than 15,000 hours of community services, performing tasks that would have cost the county an estimated $92,000 if community corrections clients had not performed them.
West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals Justice Brent Benjamin, has attended all three of the local drug court graduation and said he was proud to see seven graduates Monday, a sure sign the program is picking up momentum. While speed of completion and statistics were to be commended, he said they were not the most important things to recognize during the graduation ceremony.
“The lives changed are what matter,” he said.
To the grads, he said, “Get out there, and start the rest of your lives.”
The keynote speaker for the day, West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals Chief Justice Elliott “Spike” Maynard, changed his address after hearing the previous graduates speak.
“I don’t know anything I could say that would be as powerful as what Melissa Tedder and Kenneth Shrader had to say,” he said.
There are five drug courts in operation in West Virginia — three for adults and two for juveniles. Maynard said their successes prove to judges and observers alike that putting people behind bars isn’t always the answer.
“This works. This saves lives and saves families,” he said.
Though he said words would never be enough to express his pride in the treatment team and graduates, he said he still had two special ones to deliver: “Thank you.”
“Thank you for making changes in your lives,” he said. “God bless you, and thank you for being such a success and for making the program such a success.”
As the seven new graduates were called to accept their diplomas, Flanigan and Sadler touted their accomplishments in the program and tallied their drug-free days, and all announcements were met with broad smiles and a room full of applause.
At the conclusion, Flanigan announced, “To our graduates, congratulations. To our participants, you’re next.”

Scotland needs an army of 750 new drugs workers if the escalating problem of substance misuse is to be tackled effectively, according to the Scottish Drugs Forum (SDF), which submitted recommendations to the government last week in the hope they will influence its forthcoming Drugs Strategy for Scotland.
SDF director Dave Liddell said it was time to stop treating drug addiction as a medical problem and more as a social problem. He said the 750 workers proposed by the SDF would be broken down into 200 housing support posts, 200 workers to help drug users find work, 250 family support officers and 100 outreach workers.
Liddell said: "It's about wraparound treatment that goes beyond the medical focus, and those 750 posts recognise that people with drug problems, in most cases, have a range of social problems, and if they are not addressed then the chances of them addressing their drug problem is pretty remote."
He insisted that extra investment for drugs resources should come out of the regeneration budget, which is about £1.6 billion over the next three years.
Liddell said it was clear existing regeneration programmes "don't take full account of the social problems that exist in that community" and instead concentrate on the "bricks and mortar".
"It's not enough to fix housing stock on its own; it's about regenerating the entire community," he said.
"We should look at the models we use for development in third world countries where you start to prepare those communities to become more resilient, and that obviously involves education, training and employment in the local area."
Joy Barlow, head of Scottish Training on Drug and Alcohol (Strada) said it was time for everyone entering social care professions to have basic training in drug and alcohol misuse.
"Very few professionals have drug and alcohol misuse training as part of their pre-qualification or undergraduate diploma. For example, very few school teachers ever really had the opportunity to explore these issues. It is fundamental that teachers are able to identify and intervene with those children who are experiencing drug and alcohol misuse or are living with someone who is.
"The Curriculum for Excellence is going to find it hard to meet its four national characteristics, which include things such as confident learners, if quite a few of them are disadvantaged by life's circumstances, and drug and alcohol misuse can be a disabling life experience for them," she said.
"Drug and alcohol misuse probably impacts every level of professional discipline across Scotland today, and in education and training we are not hitting the spot."
Andrew Horne, director of Addaction Scotland, a drug and alcohol treatment charity, said more staff were needed to address the log jam of drug addicts who were seeking services.
"I met a guy in our service who couldn't even get on a waiting list because he was seen as not priority, and he then doesn't show up on statistics. If you can't get into treatment you can't get into rehabilitation.
"He is left out there and that happens quite a lot. You have a motivated person who can't even stabilise or detox, he can't even get his foot in the door.
"Then there are those who want to get out, but there aren't enough employability workers in the field who can help with training and education."
A Scottish government spokesman said: "We welcome the Scottish Drugs Forum's recommendations and will give them careful consideration as we develop our new drugs strategy."

Malta's first National Drugs Policy was launched which will be coordinated by a newly set up National Coordinating Unit for Drugs and Alcohol within the Ministry of Social Solidarity.
€69,000 (Lm30,000) have been allocated to Caritas for the organisation’s drug harm reduction shelter. Other entities running drug rehabilitation programmes will also benefit from financial aids, so that those who opt to follow residential care instead of a prison sentence could receive a weekly allowance.
Minister Dolores Cristina announced that the Housing Authority will be renting out two apartments for youths who finished residential programmes and need help integrating in society.
She also said the policy provides the necessary tools to battle the drug problem better in Malta. The policy streamlines the practices to be adopted by various entities involved in providing drug-related services and aims to improve the quality and increase the provision of services as well as provide a more coordinated mechanism to reduce the supply and demand of drugs.

overdose kits given to heroin addicts have saved eight lives, leading to calls for them to be provided for thousands of addicts in Scotland.
About 300 of the kits – syringes loaded with the drug naloxone – have been given to addicts' friends and families under two Scottish pilot schemes. Similar action has sharply cut deaths in Berlin, San Francisco and Chicago.
The pilot schemes, in Glasgow and South Lanarkshire, involve take-home doses of naloxone, a liquid that is injected and blocks the effects of opiates. It will keep a heroin user who is slipping into a potentially fatal coma alive for up to 20 minutes.
Under the pilots, which have been running since last April, with the cost of around £40,000 funded by local NHS boards, family members and friends of drug users are given training on how to detect the early signs of an overdose and on basic resuscitation techniques.
There have been six successful uses of the drug in Glasgow and a further two in South Lanarkshire.
But one of Scotland's leading drug experts has voiced grave fears that the drug will only encourage even more reckless drug abuse among Scotland's estimated 50,000 heroin addicts.
Neil McKeganey, professor of drug misuse research at Glasgow University, also believes giving drug users' families needles to take home will put children in danger and says the pilots are not being properly evaluated.
With the number of drug deaths hitting a record high of 421 in 2006 and a similar figure expected for 2007, experts say naloxone kits should be given to thousands of addicts' relatives and friends around the country.
Dr Jane Jay, chairwoman of the National Drug Death Forum, said: "This drug has, in a number of cases, made the difference between life and death. The cost is relatively low, but I would also ask 'what price a life'?"
She is now urging Kenny MacAskill, the justice secretary, to approve a national roll-out of naloxone among all heroin addicts in Scotland.

sleeping drug which actor Heath Ledger had admitted taking has been linked to six deaths in the UK.
Figures obtained by the Sunday Herald have revealed that six fatal suspected adverse drug reactions to zolpidem have been reported to Britain's medicines watchdog since 2001.
Almost 200 further incidents of adverse reactions, ranging from psychiatric and cardiac disorders to "injuries" and eye disorders have also been reported to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
Ledger was found dead by his housekeeper at his New York apartment last Tuesday. Pills were found near his body and Ledger recently admitted taking the prescription drug Ambien - the trade name of zolpidem in America - to combat insomnia.
Results of a postmortem examination last week on the 28-year-old actor, who had won acclaim in films such as Brokeback Mountain, are inconclusive, but there has been speculation he died from an accidental overdose of sleeping pills.
This prompted movie star Jack Nicholson to say the tragedy could be a warning about the dangers of certain sleeping pills. Nicholson said he had taken Ambien and it had serious side effects.
During a promotional visit to London for his latest film he said: "I warn people about Ambien. I almost drove off a cliff once. I don't take sleeping pills but somebody said, take this, it's mild'.
"I got a call in the middle of the night, kind of an emergency, and I almost drove off a cliff 50 yards from my house. I live up in the mountains in Aspen. It's something to warn people about."
The figures from the MHRA show the incidents recorded under its "yellow card" scheme, which doctors use to alert the agency to patients suffering side-effects to a drug. Health professionals and patients report reactions on a voluntary basis - companies are legally obliged to do so - and it is designed to act as an early warning system to flag up any previously unrecognised problems.
A total of 197 suspected adverse drug reactions have been reported to date in connection with zolpidem - which is marketed as Stilnoct in the UK - the majority of which were categorised as psychiatric disorders.
Six cases of deaths linked to a suspected adverse reaction to the drug were also recorded - three involving psychiatric disorders, with the rest categorised as general disorders, injuries and vascular disorders.
Last year research by Australia's Federal Health Department linked zolpidem to a series of incidents of strange behaviour, including a woman who painted her front door while still asleep.
Problems involving zolpidem have emerged in America, where some people have been injured by cars driven by people under the influence of the drug.
A spokesman for the MHRA said the safety of zolpidem has been "carefully monitored" and product information had been updated to include warnings of psychiatric adverse effects.
A spokesman for Sanofi Aventis, which makes Stilnoct, said it could not comment on the MHRA figures, but said when taken as prescribed, the drug was "generally well tolerated".

The majority of deaths were of males (72 per cent)
73 per cent of all deaths were under the age of 45 years.
56 per cent of cases died from accidental poisoning. This is a five percent increase compared with the previous year. However, the proportion of intentional self-poisoning cases remained stable at 35 percent.
Opiates/opioids (i.e. heroin/morphine; methadone; other opiate/opioid analgesics), alone or in combination with other drugs, accounted for the majority of fatalities (68 per cent) in 2004. Even though the total number of deaths had fallen between 2003 and 2004, the number of deaths involving heroin/morphine was virtually unchanged and so there has been an increase in the proportion of deaths involving heroin/morphine by 6% (to 46%). The proportions of deaths involving other illicit drugs remained stable.

Ireland as a society entering a 10-year cocaine epidemic. Dr Luke predicted there would be 'dozens and dozens' of further deaths such as Katy's over the next decade.
'There is a spiralling interest in drug-taking among children and teenagers, which also perfectly fits the same curve of the distribution of leaflets and drug talks. I do worry that all you are doing is exposing them to a menu that they might dabble in,' he said
Philomena Lynott, who will mark the 21st anniversary this January of her son's death from a cocktail of alcohol and drugs, condemned the widespread use of drugs such as cocaine in Ireland.
Stephen Rowen, clinical director of the Dublin-based Rutland Centre, said: 'Cocaine is quite available, it's in most pubs and virtually every city, town and village in Ireland. We have no way of knowing before people use it how it will affect them - if they could have a stroke, heart attack, some severe medical reaction, or get addicted, which is a very expensive and horrific way to live.'
Katy, 24, died in hospital after collapsing and falling into a coma at a friend's house in Ashbourne, Co Meath, last weekend. Preliminary tests indicate she had cocaine in her bloodstream. The star of the Celebrities Go Wild series had been drinking champagne at her friend's home but, contrary to earlier reports, there was no party taking place.
A gramme of cocaine in Dublin costs around €40 (£29), making the Republic one of the cheapest places to buy the drug in the industrial world. Its widespread availability is due, in part, to geography: the Irish coastline provides an ideal 'dumping point' for drug cartels and gangsters smuggling cocaine by sea from South America via the West African coast to Europe.

Deaths in England and Wales caused by alcohol related disease have doubled in the last 20 years, and the year to 2001 showed the highest percentage increase in alcohol-related deaths for any year since 1979.

The age at which these deaths occur is increasingly younger and younger. The death rate for those aged between 25 and 44 has tripled since 1979. There are even more deaths where alcohol has been involved, such as accidents and suicides.

As the liver is the principal organ responsible for breaking down alcohol it bears the brunt of excessive drinking. The first stage of alcohol-related liver disease is "fatty liver". This is a side effect of the liver's attempts to break down alcohol, and is the accumulation of excess fat in the liver. It is often symptom-free, but is picked up during routine medical examinations. Although very common in heavy drinkers, it is also commonly found in those drinking just above the recommended limits. Fatty liver is often the precursor to a number of severe liver diseases such as alcoholic hepatitis and cirrhosis.

In cases of alcoholic hepatitis, giving up alcohol combined with a good diet can lead to a complete recovery, although death rates in alcoholic hepatitis are high. In the case of cirrhosis however, the illness affects the liver's ability to regenerate itself and there is no cure. If the sufferer continues to drink it will bring about complete liver failure. 10% of those suffering from cirrhosis go on to develop liver cancer, which is fatal within 6 months. It is unclear why some individuals go on to develop these severe diseases whilst others consuming similar quantities of alcohol do not.

Three per cent of the organs transplanted into patients in the past five years came from donors with a history of drug abuse - some of whom died from an overdose - figures obtained under the Freedom of Information Act have revealed.

One transplant surgeon said doctors were "desperate" for organs and had to use some they would otherwise have rejected.

Designer drugs are powerful synthetic psychedelics from the same chemical families as LSD, magic mushrooms and mescaline. They are too new to have enticing street names; instead their lengthy chemical names are shortened to abbreviations such as 2C-I, 4-HO-DiPT, and 5-Meo-DMT. Unlike ecstasy, methamphetamine or other synthetic recreational drugs, the new compounds are not made in illicit factories or backroom kitchen laboratories. Instead, "research chemicals", as they are euphemistically known, are synthesised by commercial labs, often based in the US, which openly sell their products on the internet.

DMT Dimethyltryptamine

Found in minute quantities in certain Amazonian plants and in the human brain. Smoked, the effects are nearly instantaneous and very strange. "The closest you'll get to experiencing death bar actually dying" as one user put it.

Dose 2-60mg
Duration Less than 10 minutes
Legal status Class A
Price £100 a gram on the street

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5-Meo-DMT Methoxydimethyltryptamine

A more powerful sister compound of DMT, occurring naturally in the venom of the Bufo alvarius toad but generally smoked in synthesised form. Not uncommon for those who take large amounts to suffer psychological and emotional difficulties for weeks afterwards.

Dose 1-20mg (smaller than a grain of salt)
Duration 5-20 minutes
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $175 (about £90) a gram

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2C-I (2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodophenethylamine)

Most likely candidate for the coveted title "the next ecstasy".

Powerful psychedelic stimulant described as a cross between MDMA and LSD but with much gentler side-effects. Already appearing in pill form on the UK dance scene.

Dose 10-25mg
Duration 5-8 hours
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $299 a gram web price; £10 a pill on the street

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2C-T-2 (2,5-dimethyoxy-4-ethylthiophenethylamine)

Respected psychedelic, from the same phenethylamine family as MDMA and mescaline.

Noted for its warmth and "outrageous visuals".

Dose 10-25mg
Duration 5-8 hours
Legal status Class A but available to buy on the internet
Price $299 a gram web price; £10 a pill on the street

New drugs are powerful synthetic psychedelics from the same chemical families as LSD, magic mushrooms and mescaline. They are too new to have enticing street names; instead their lengthy chemical names are shortened to abbreviations such as 2C-I, 4-HO-DiPT, and 5-Meo-DMT. Unlike ecstasy, methamphetamine or other synthetic recreational drugs, the new compounds are not made in illicit factories or backroom kitchen laboratories. Instead, "research chemicals", as they are euphemistically known, are synthesised by commercial labs, often based in the US, which openly sell their products on the internet.

The rapid growth in the transatlantic online trade in such chemicals has been fuelled by international differences over legality. While Britain has outlawed all of these drugs - under an amendment to the Misuse Of Drugs Act in February 2002 - they remain legal in most other countries, including the majority of EU member states. Even in the US, despite some of the most draconian anti-drug laws in the world, the bulk of research chemicals are legal to manufacture, sell, possess and consume.

With ecstasy dropping in price and popularity, users and dealers in this country are looking further afield to obtain new highs. A recent Home Office survey found that ecstasy use had dropped 21% in the last year. The street price had also dropped to an all time low of £2-£3 a pill.

But while most research chemicals are too psychedelically powerful to make it as club drugs, one, 2C-I, is rapidly gaining popularity in this country as a dance drug, thanks to some similarities in effect to MDMA, the main ingredient of ecstasy. More than 125 pills of the drug were seized by police last year, including 65 at the Glastonbury festival, and some London dealers are offering it for £10 a tablet.

Methamphetamine can be cooked up using a handful of household chemicals, but byproducts can include toxic waste in the local water supply, fires and explosions.

Globally, users are said to outnumber those of heroin and cocaine combined, but its prevalence in the UK is still a matter of some debate.

The UK is further removed from the suspected "meth labs" of Mexico and south-east Asia, than Australia and the rural US, where methamphetamine use is said to have reached epidemic proportions.

Among the new flavors are strawberry, known as "Strawberry Quick," chocolate, cola and other sodas, Robertson said. One agent reported a red methamphetamine that had been marketed as a powdered form of an energy drink, he said.

A patrol officer who stopped a car on Feb. 13 in a rural area of Greene County, Mo., seized a bag of "strawberry meth" from a female passenger, says Capt. Randy Gibson of the Greene County Sheriff's Department. The seized drug had a slight strawberry smell to it, he said.

Greene County deputies have seized colored meth before, Gibson says. Several years ago, blue methamphetamine, known as "Smurf dope" circulated in the area, Gibson said.

"It was nothing more than one of the local meth cooks taking a great deal of pride in his purity," Gibson says. "He ground up blue chalk to color it so he could market it as his."

Carson City, Nev., Undersheriff Steve Albertson says dealers often try to make their meth distinctive with color or a catchy name as a way to brand it. "Then they'll spread the word that this meth, whatever color it is, is the best kind of meth there is," he said.

The appearance of "Strawberry Quick" in Greene County came less than two weeks after the Nevada

The sale of some cold remedies will be restricted to one small pack per customer in Britain to prevent gangs making the crack-like drug, crystal meth.


Government medical advisors said on Wednesday that large packs of decongestants containing the chemicals ephedrine and pseudoephedrine would be withdrawn from sale.

They would be replaced by packs of 12 or 24 tablets containing a total of 720 mg of the drugs.

The move follows police concerns that criminals are using the ingredients to manufacture methylamphetamine – crystal meth – in illegal laboratories.

Although use of the drug is low in Britain, the government is anxious to prevent the problem growing to the serious levels seen elsewhere.

However, the medicines will remain on sale at pharmacies and not become prescription-only, as had been suggested in a consultation which ended in June.

Drugs manufacturers, who had lobbied against prescription-only sales, welcomed the new restrictions.

"This is a sensible and proportionate approach to a problem that is still almost non-existent in this country, but one we all want to avoid," said Sheila Kelly, executive director of the Proprietary Association of Great Britain (PAGB).

There has been only known case – on the Isle of Wight – of an illegal crystal meth lab in Britain using pharmacy products, the PAGB says.

The restriction will affect around one in 10 cold remedies sold in Britain, including versions of Actifed, Benylin, Lemsip, Meltus and Sudafed.

All are already only sold in chemists and are kept behind the counter.

The smaller pack sizes would be sufficient for around three days' treatment, the PAGB said.

Most people only need to take decongestants for one or two days, it added.

A government advisory body will monitor the restrictions for the next two years to check they are working.

It will retain the option to recommend moving the medicines to prescription sale if the measures do not reduce the risk of illegal crystal meth manufacture.

Methamphetamine can be cooked up using a handful of household chemicals, but byproducts can include toxic waste in the local water supply, fires and explosions.
Sold as crystals, pills or powder, it can be smoked, swallowed or injected and is said to be highly addictive.

Globally, users are said to outnumber those of heroin and cocaine combined.

Seven years in jail and an unlimited fine, while dealers could be jailed for life.
Sends the wrong message to teenage drug users
heavy use can lead to paranoia, kidney failure, violence, internal bleeding and less inhibited sexual behaviour.

Crystal is made of highly volatile, toxic substances (based on such chemical "precursors" as methylamine and amyl amine) that are melded in differing combinations, forming what some have described as a "mix of laundry detergent and lighter fluid."

The mixes are never exactly the same, but basic types are a rough yellow substance called Hydro and a smooth white blend called Glass. Half a gram costs around £25 and a £15 hit would probably keep you going for a few days.

The drug can either be snorted or injected, or in its crystal form 'ice' smoked in a pipe, and brings on a feeling of exhilaration and a sharpening of focus. Smoking ice results in an instantaneous dose of almost pure drug to the brain, giving a huge rush followed by a feeling of euphoria for anything from 2-16 hours.

For some this could result in obsessive cleaning or tidying, but for many the biggest bonus is the sense of sexual liberation which can result in mad, abandoned sex for hours - sometimes days - on end.

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