An Objective Look at the Harmfulness of Drugs


	An Objective Look at the Harmfulness of Drugs

Karmic Mishap

3-29-2007 2:05 AM

334 views

tags:

drugs, drug policy, criminalization

Karmic Mishap says:

There's an obvious idea here, but people tend to pay a bit more attention to scientists than others. A study has been published which attempts to classify drugs by actual harmfulness, rather than arbitrary cultural BS standards. The results should surprise no one.

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<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/52260d22-58dc-4ed6-9c49-08c771f40d9d/727DA849-8905-4F8A-B2D7-FC4044BAADBB/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html" href="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html" style="font-size: 11px;">www.bris.ac.uk</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html">
A new study published today in the <EM>Lancet</EM> proposes that drugs should be classified by the amount of harm that they do</blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><P>Alcohol and tobacco more harmful than cannabis and ecstacy.</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><H1 id="news-article-heading">New ‘matrix of harm’ for drugs of abuse</H1></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><P id="news-article-date"><STRONG>Press release</STRONG> issued 23 March 2007</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><P>The new ranking places alcohol and tobacco in the upper half of the league table. These socially accepted drugs were judged more harmful than cannabis, and substantially more dangerous than the Class A drugs LSD, 4-methylthioamphetamine and ecstasy.</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><OL>
    <li style="margin-left:16px;padding-left: 0px;">the physical harm to the individual user caused by the drug</LI>
    <li style="margin-left:16px;padding-left: 0px;">	the tendency of the drug to induce dependence </LI>
    <li style="margin-left:16px;padding-left: 0px;">	the effect of drug use on families, communities, and society</LI>
</OL></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html"><P>The process proved simple, and yielded roughly similar scores for drug harm when used by two separate groups of experts. </P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.bris.ac.uk/news/2007/5367.html">“Drug policy is primarily aimed at reducing the harm to individual users, their families and society. But at present there is no rational, evidence-based method for assessing the harm of drugs.</blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/727DA849-8905-4F8A-B2D7-FC4044BAADBB/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content8.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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