HONESTY IS THE ANTIDOTE TO DRUGS USE

Mairead Scannell, writing as a spokesperson for Positive Action for
Children (The Examiner Letters, December 7), says the claims she made
about the negative effects of cannabis in her previous letter
(November 20) were taken from an excellent article in that most
respected of publications, The Reader's Digest.

I too have read the article of which she speaks (Reader's Digest,
September 1998) and and if anyone would like a copy of the article
they can email me and I will forward them one. The article was a
collection of half truths, scare mongering, and downright lies.

And furthermore, Ms Scannell claimed that Researchers in the
University of Mississippi have collected more than 13,000 technical
studies on cannabis which showed that young people who were regular
users developed head and neck cancers.

The original Reader's Digest article said: Researchers at the
University of Mississippi have collected more than 13,000 technical
studies on cannabis hundreds of them pointing to its malign effects.

Let us try to protect our children. But let's give them truthful
information. If we tell them untruths about a relatively harmless
substance such as cannabis, they may stop believing what we say about
the genuinely harmful substances.

Martin Cooke,
Corcormick, Drumkeerin, Co Leitrim, mcooke2@iol.ie