Through The Wrong Gate

THE DRUGS TSAR HAS JUMPED TO CONCLUSIONS

Beware of shroud wavers. Be doubly wary when the issues involved is the
highly controversial - and complex - issue of drug control. Yesterday the
drug tsar became an overt politician. Drawing himself up to his full former
chief constable's height, Keith Hellawell told a press conference assembled
for his second annual report that he was now convinced cannabis was "a
gateway drug". He said he had always been reluctant to use the term. But he
was now convinced by a new study of drug-taking habits in New Zealand. It
concluded, he claimed, that young people who smoked a joint once a week
were 60 times more likely to progress to harder drugs. He went on: "The
pro-legalisers who have said that cannabis isn't a gateway drug will have
to look at this very hard and long."

To be fair to the tsar, the new study is not one of those snapshot surveys
showing that a large majority of hard drug users had earlier used cannabis.
These prove nothing, but are regularly interpreted by commentators who fail
to draw a distinction between an association and a causal relation. Such
surveys cannot prove causality. They ignore the huge proportion of cannabis
users who never take up hard drugs. The new study is "longitudinal" in the
jargon, following young people from birth to the age of 21. It has ben
carried out by well-respected social scientists. It is full of caveats as
well as extremely esoteric statistical analysis. It does not state what the
tsar implied: that if you use cannabis you will invariably progress to
regular addictive hard drugs. It emphasises "harder" not "hard" drugs.

The long list includes prescription drugs and magic mushrooms. hard drugs,
including heroin and cocaine, accounted for mere 4%. Even then, it was not
suggesting this was an addictive move, but merely an initial taste. Mo
Mowlam, the drugs minister, was right to be more skeptical. But then she,
unlike the tsar, is a social scientist and more ready to resist Tony
Blair's hard line.