CANNABIS... CALL IT ANYTHING BUT 'SOFT'

The Debate Over the Drug Is No Longer About Liberty. It's About Health

Seldom does a leading newspaper take a high-profile stand in favour
of drug liberalisation. It is less common still for such a campaign
to be publicly retracted. The Independent on Sunday deserves great
credit for having the courage to change its mind on cannabis on the
basis of mounting evidence of just how dangerous the world's most
popular illicit drug has become.

It cannot have been an easy decision. Many readers undoubtedly
subscribe to the vague, laissez-faire tolerance of cannabis
increasingly prevalent among educated people in Western countries.
That growing consensus needs to be challenged.

Supporters of legalisation would have us believe that cannabis is a
gentle, harmless substance that gives users little more than a sense
of mellow euphoria and hurts no one else. It's not an unattractive
image. Sellers of "skunk" know better. Trawl through websites
offering cannabis seeds for sale and you will find brand names such
as Armageddon, AK-47 and White Widow. "This will put you in pieces,
then reduce you to rubble - maybe quicksand if you go too far," one
Glasgow-based seller boasts. This is much closer to the truth.

The cannabis now in circulation is many times more powerful than the
weed that today's ageing baby-boomers smoked in college. In the
flower-power era, the concentration of THC, as the main psychoactive
substance in cannabis is known, was typically 2 or 3 per cent.
Present-day cannabis can contain 10 times as much.

Today's skunk is a product of several developments in cannabis
cultivation: the "sinsemilla technique" (the cultivation of only
unfertilised female plants); the use of indoor growing technologies;
and the use of plant strains bred for higher yield and potency.

Evidence of the damage to mental health caused by cannabis use - from
loss of concentration to paranoia, aggressiveness and outright
psychosis - is mounting and cannot be ignored. Emergency-room
admissions involving cannabis are rising, as is demand for
rehabilitation treatment.

Amid all the libertarian talk about the right of individuals to
engage in dangerous practices provided no one else gets hurt, certain
key facts are easily forgotten. First, cannabis is a dangerous drug -
not just to the individuals who use it. People who drive under the
influence of cannabis put others at risk. Would even the most ardent
supporter of legalisation want to fly in an aircraft whose pilot used cannabis?

Second, drug control works. More than a century of universally
accepted restrictions on heroin and cocaine have prevented a
pandemic. Global levels of drug addiction - think of the opium dens
of the 19th century - have dropped dramatically in the past 100
years. In the past 10 years or so, they have remained stable. The
drug problem is being contained and our societies are safer and
healthier as a result.

The exception is cannabis, the weakest link in the chain. It is a
weed that grows under the most varied conditions in many countries,
which makes supply control difficult. But we can tackle demand,
especially among the young. That need not mean sending them to jail.
Young people caught in possession of cannabis could be treated in
much the same way as those arrested for drink driving -- fined,
required to attend classes on the dangers of drug use and threatened
with loss of their driving licence for repeat offences.

I am increasingly convinced countries get the drug problem they
deserve. Those that invest political capital - backed by adequate
resources - in prevention, treatment and rehabilitation are rewarded
with significantly lower rates of drug abuse.

Sweden is an excellent example. Drug use is just a third of the
European average while spending on drug control is three times the EU
average. For three decades, Sweden has had consistent and coherent
drug-control policies, regardless of which party is in power. There
is a strong emphasis on prevention, drug laws have been progressively
tightened, and extensive treatment and rehabilitation opportunities
are available to users. The police take drug crime seriously.

Governments and societies must keep their nerve and avoid being
swayed by misguided notions of tolerance. They must not lose sight of
the fact that illicit drugs are dangerous - that is why the world
agreed to restrict them.

The global cannabis market is changing. Traditional suppliers to the
UK such as Morocco - the world's largest producer of cannabis resin -
are slashing cultivation. That is more than offset by an increase in
home-grown cannabis, now the main source of supply for most major
markets. In Britain, demand will increasingly be met by
well-organised indoor production with links to criminal networks.
This represents a growing challenge for police.

Drug prevention and treatment will need to change in response to the
effects of more powerful cannabis varieties on cognitive capacity,
memory and emotional development, as well as schizophrenia among
vulnerable individuals exposed to the drug. Public attitudes also
need to change. The IoS has provided a valuable lead. It is time to
explode the myth of cannabis as a "soft" drug.