Category Archives: Drugs policy

Scotland records huge rise in drug-related deaths

Posted on by

Twenty seven per cent rise to 1,187 deaths puts country on par with US in terms of per capita fatalities

Scotland’s drug-related death toll has increased by 27% over the past year to reach a record high of 1,187, putting the country on a par in terms of the fatality rate per capita with the United States, where synthetic opioids like fentanyl have devastated drug-using populations.

The death rate is now more than three times that of England and Wales, and has more than doubled since 2008, when there were 574 deaths.

Continue reading...

‘There’s no opposition now’: how a quiet Canada town became a world leader in growing weed

Posted on by
In an abandoned chocolate factory in Ontario, Canopy Growth is nurturing global ambitions. But could it thrive in Britain?

The musky aroma hits you from the car park at the headquarters of Canopy Growth, the world’s largest cannabis company.

Inside this nondescript warehouse – an abandoned Hershey’s chocolate factory in Smiths Falls, Canada – awaits the stuff of a stoner’s wildest dreams. Myriad rooms teem with row upon row of bushy marijuana plants at various stages of maturity, under intense lamplight, swaying in the breeze of dozens of fans.

Continue reading...

Synthetic opioid use booms worldwide amid Africa ‘crisis’, UN says

Posted on by

Death in US are still rising due to fentanyl addiction, but report highlights alarming take-up of painkiller tramadol in Africa

Synthetic opioid use is booming around the world, acccording to a United Nations report that showed deaths in the United States from overdoses are still rising and a “crisis” of tramadol use is emerging in parts of Africa.

The estimated number of people using opioids – an umbrella term for drugs ranging from opium and derivatives such as heroin to synthetics like fentanyl and tramadol – in 2017 was 56% higher than in 2016, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said in the report published on Wednesday.

Continue reading...

UK refuses to back ‘game-changing’ resolution on drug pricing

Posted on by

Global agreement urges governments to share information on actual cost of medicines, with aim of making them more affordable

The UK government has refused to sign up to a global resolution on greater transparency for drug pricing.

The resolution urges governments and others buying health products to share information on actual prices paid, and pushes for greater transparency on patents, clinical trial results and other factors affecting pricing from laboratories to patients.

Continue reading...

Home Office gives green light to first drug testing clinic

Posted on by
‘Life-saving’ scheme, licensed by the government, launched amid rising concern over potentially toxic substances

The first drug-checking service licensed by the Home Office will allow users to have their illicit substances tested without fear of being arrested in a move that could be rolled out nationally if it is shown to save lives.

The year-long pilot project, which had a soft launch in Weston-super-Mare, Somerset, last Friday but begins in earnest this week, will allow anyone over the age of 18 to take their drugs to the clinic, run by the charity Addaction. Testing the content will take about 10 minutes, during which time the user will complete a short questionnaire to allow harm reduction advice to be tailored to them.

Continue reading...

The white stuff: why Britain can’t get enough cocaine

Posted on by

Britain snorts more of the drug than almost anywhere in Europe, more young people are taking it and deaths are rising. Why?

The moment Dan (not his real name) realised he had a problem with cocaine, he had been off work for a week, sick with flu. His phone buzzed. It was his cocaine dealer, calling to check he was OK. When Dan, one of his favoured customers, hadn’t been in touch to buy the cocaine he usually took several times a week, the dealer knew something was wrong.

“I don’t like thinking about that,” Dan says, shaking his head as we sit in a London pub. Now 36, Dan estimates he has spent £25,000 on cocaine. Lines in the pub on a Friday night after work. Lines on a Wednesday evening at a friend’s house while earnestly discussing 90s hip-hop. Lines at house parties, weddings, birthday parties and for no reason at all, other than that cocaine – the white powder that makes no one a better version of themselves, but that many of us continue to do anyway – is everywhere and freely available.

Continue reading...

‘I don’t trust the government to look after me or my dog’: meet the Brexit stockpilers

Posted on by

Some people are stockpiling food, medicine and even pet treats in anticipation of mass shortages after a no-deal Brexit. Are they overreacting, or should we be following their example?

Jo Elgarf doesn’t look like you would imagine a prepper to look. She’s not a swivel-eyed libertarian, camouflaged and armed to the eyeballs, crawling around the woods in Montana, skinning a squirrel for breakfast and fuelling up for the apocalypse. She lives with her husband and three young children in a sleepy suburb of south-west London.

Elgarf is happy to call herself a prepper, though; she is a member – and a moderator – of one of a growing number of prepper groups on social media. Hers – an anti-Brexit Facebook group called 48% Preppers – gets between 100 and 200 requests a day to join. Everyone wants to be ready for a no-deal Brexit.

Continue reading...