Source: BBC News

29 October 2009

Prof Nutt said skunk use had not caused an upswing in schizophrenia

The row over the reclassification of cannabis has been reignited after the
government’s chief drug adviser accused ministers of “devaluing” the
evidence.

Professor David Nutt, who heads the Advisory Council on the Misuse of
Drugs, says it does not cause major health problems.

He accused ex-home secretary Jacqui Smith, who reclassified the drug, of
“devaluing” scientific research.

The Home Office said these opinions “do not reflect the views of government”.

A spokesman said: “Prof Nutt’s views are his own.”

He added: “The government is clear: we are determined to crack down on all
illegal substances and minimise their harm to health and society as a
whole.”

It comes after Prof Nutt used a lecture at King’s College in London and
briefing paper to attack what he called the “artificial” separation of
alcohol and tobacco from other, illegal, drugs.

Precautionary measure

The professor said smoking cannabis created only a “relatively small risk”
of psychotic illness, and claimed those who advocated moving ecstasy into
Class B from Class A had “won the intellectual argument”.

Public concern over the links between high-strength cannabis, known as
skunk, and mental illness led the government to reclassify cannabis to
Class B from C last year.

The decision was taken despite official advisers recommending against the
change.

Ministers said they wanted to make the move as a precautionary measure.

The Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) review of cannabis
classification, which was ordered in 2007, was the result of a “skunk
scare”, according to the professor.

In his lecture and briefing paper, entitled Estimating Drug Harms: A Risky
Business?, he repeated his claim that the risks of taking ecstasy are no
worse than riding a horse.

Prof Nutt also warned that the reclassification decision may lead to more
people taking the drug.

“It may be that if you move a drug up a class it has a greater cachet”, he
said, adding the government’s approach “starts to distort the value of
evidence”.

He cited research which “estimates that, to prevent one episode of
schizophrenia, we would need to stop about 5,000 men aged 20 to 25 years
from ever using the drug”.

He said skunk has been in wide usage for about 10 years but, he claims,
there has been no upswing in schizophrenia.

The professor accepts cannabis can sometimes cause mental illness, but
argues it is safer than tobacco and alcohol and, overall, does not lead to
major health problems.

Prof Nutt said: “We have to accept young people like to experiment – with
drugs and other potentially harmful activities – and what we should be
doing in all of this is to protect them from harm at this stage of their
lives.

“We therefore have to provide more accurate and credible information. If
you think that scaring kids will stop them using, you are probably wrong.”

Following these comments, a spokesman for the ACMD said: “The lecture Prof
Nutt gave at King’s College was in his academic capacity and was not in
his role as chair of the ACMD.

“We acknowledge that the lecture has prompted further debate on the harms
of drugs.”

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