Scientists say alcohol is nearly as harmful as heroin Options

[simon]

This is in the UK news today, what are your thoughts and comments ?


http://news.uk.msn.com/Article.aspx?cp-documentid=4405588


Scientists say alcohol is nearly as harmful as heroin

Alcohol is ranked almost as harmful as heroin in a controversial new drug classification system proposed by a team of leading scientists.

The class A drug Ecstasy, possession of which can result in a seven-year prison sentence, is placed near the bottom of the league table which lists "harm scores" for different substances.

LSD, another class A drug, is also considered relatively safe despite its powerful hallucinogenic properties.

Cannabis, recently downgraded to class C, occupies a middle position. It is rated more dangerous than Ecstasy, LSD and the dance floor drug GHB, but less harmful than tobacco.

The table, published in The Lancet medical journal, was drawn up by a team of highly respected scientists led by Professor David Nutt, from the University of Bristol, and Professor Colin Blakemore, chief executive of the Medical Research Council.

It is intended to be a model for policy makers which is more scientifically based than the current Misuse of Drugs Act system that attaches "a, b, and c" labels to illicit drugs.

The scientists identified three main factors that together determined the harmfulness of a controlled substance.

These were: The physical harm to the individual user caused by the drug, the tendency of the drug to induce dependence, and the effect of the drug's use on families, communities and society.

Unsurprisingly, the results placed heroin at the head of the table with an overall "harm score" of 2.7, followed by cocaine which scored 2.3.

But more controversially, alcohol is ranked as the fifth most dangerous drug, scoring just under 2 on the table.

[Rick]

It's about time, but they still haven't got it completely right. Alcohol is more harmful than heroin. Alcohol is much more toxic and causes brain and liver damage with long term use. Heroin is actually safer than morphine because tolerance buildup is less rapid and it has less toxicity in effective doses for control of pain.

[simon]

...and far more available. I struggle to not apply a conspiracy theory as to the constant supply and promotion of such dumb-drugs and the hysterically perverse disinformation forced into some show of fact. Obviously I am not qualified to evaluate legislation or for that matter common sense (nor, it seems, are the qualified).

[µ-active]

what a ridiculous hippie-crap, that table, hahahahaha

[Rick]

No facts or arguments? Go for the ad hominem!

[code buttons]

what a ridiculous hippie-crap, that table, hahahahaha

Thank you for letting us know so much about you with such a short sentence! LOL!!!
Seriously, though, my opinion about alcohol is simple: Aside from all the harmful effects to the body, its greates danger lies in the fact that it's not ilegal, and more readily available than any other drug, therefore.
Why so much fuss about pot, for instance? It's not brewed or artifitially made, it's not injected, it doesn't kill anybody in motor vehicle accidents (as compared to 500,000 or so alcohol realted deaths yearly in the US alone), and it comes straight from god (or the earth, if you want to call it that)!

[µ-active]

well ok, if they mean by the term "heroin" that dirty brown powder iv-administrated by non-sterile syringes, than they might be right with their placement in the list. if they mean diamorphine as such, then definitely not.

the next point i rate as "ridiculous", is claiming that lsd, mdma and cannabis are harmless. that somehow leaves the impresssion (at least to myself) that the two authors had widespread "illuminating" experiences with these substances in their own youth. obviously they completely ignore rehabs full of psychotics due to lsd/ cannabis/ mdma in their highly scientific study.
that much concerning the term "hippie-crap"

[Rick]

Can you list these rehabs full of psychotics? How many patients, and how many are diagnosed with psychosis induced by drug use?

[µ-active]

rick, i think you can do this research on your own if you are really interested in it.

otherwise, if your 2 questions were just meant as a provocation, then it would be nice if you could instead simply write down your opinion in the form of a sentence.

[Rick]

My research came up negative. A typical Web page on the subject is the following:

Substance Use and Psychosis
http://www.psychosissucks.ca/epi/substanceuseandpsych.cfm

or this one:

Psychosis Among Substance Users
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/528487

Neither one mentions "rehabs full of psychotics due to lsd/ cannabis/ mdma", nor does the Wikipedia entry on drug abuse.

One of the problems with trying to establish a cause-effect relationship between illegal drug use and psychosis is that some psychotics use illegal drugs to self medicate.

[Orbz]

the next point i rate as "ridiculous", is claiming that lsd, mdma and cannabis are harmless. that somehow leaves the impresssion (at least to myself) that the two authors had widespread "illuminating" experiences with these substances in their own youth. obviously they completely ignore rehabs full of psychotics due to lsd/ cannabis/ mdma in their highly scientific study.

They never intended to label mdma/lsd/cannabis etc as harmless, only to put them into perspective with other drugs that are used and abused. As such, it is relative harm in comparison to the others. Also note that it wasn't the authors that rated them, so it's not their hippie, liberal, left wing agenda but it was practitioners in the field that rated the substance based on their experiences. I've also met David Nutt, he's hardly the hippie you espouse him to be.

The problem in rehab clinics isn't mdma, cannabis or lsd it's alcohol, methamphetamine, cocaine and heroin. Alcohol has a particularly nasty and dangerous withdrawal syndrome if done cold turkey. The problem psychosis inducing drugs aren't mdma, cannabis or lsd, it's cocaine and methamphetamine.

[Phi]

Anything can be abused and considered a drug. If danger is from a physical perspective, I would view a drug that causes the quickest addictive properties as the most harmful as that drug. Addictive property gives the means to allow the most damage(long and short term) as the user cannot see or refuses to believe that damage outweighs sobriety. Alcohol is a nasty drug that will linger in a persons life, but i think it's a hell of a lot easier to stop than heroin/meth/crack.

[Orbz]

Alcohol is a nasty drug that will linger in a persons life, but i think it's a hell of a lot easier to stop than heroin/meth/crack.

I don't know about a hell of a lot easier, but certainly easier; although it is more dangerous to stop suddenly.

It's hard to quantify addictive potential. Route of administration, half-life, subjective reinforcement (e.g., euphoria), unconscious reinforcement (perhaps level of dopamine activity) etc.

[trojan_libido]

The reason that the research does not take into account the 'rehabs full of psychotics' is probably because there is no confirmed link and no real circumstancial evidence for it.

If they were really psychotic then they wouldn't be in rehab. You seem to be confusing how we recover from an addiction with how we live with psychological disorders.

My brother died from heroin and crack abuse. He spent half his life in jail due to shoplifting and such to fund his habit. Whenever he was on a binge, he was also drinking. Alcohol was his default baseline.

My oldest friend from a broken and abusive home, was burned very badly in his late teens. He was always a drunk, but now he's dangerously close to complete failure of several organs, and its down to alcohol abuse. When he manages not to drink, he simply self medicates with prescription downers and sleeps. He classes this as him not drinking, when really its just him not concious. He can drink 8 cans of lager, then actually believe himself when he says 'I've not had a drink today' simply because it didn't get him drunk.

Society is a hypocritical and ignorant collection of people. Either people know of the dangers of alcohol and admitting it would cause to much mental and political unrest, or they don't really know much of anything about drugs and have far too much to say about it.

The 'War on Drugs' is a political strategy for fooling dumb voters and its also somewhere to place the blame for the deterioration of society, instead of placing blame on the politicians. it just doesn't actually make any difference to supply, it only compromises the safety of the user. The safety of the user has already been compromised when we are surrounded by alcohol and nicotine in 'safe' enviroments.

This really gets my back up because these studies are being done the world over, and they always yield the same results. The damn politicians ignore those results, and then say they're acting in our best interests!

[Phi]

All of this leads to what I mean: escapism is the worst drug. Don't focus on the drugs fuckers, focus on the reason. (You aren't the fuckers)

[trojan_libido]

Exactly Phi, the problem isn't the drug. Because food, shopping and gambling have been known to cause just as many problems. Its our inability to stay objective when we crave the experiences.

[code buttons]

All of this leads to what I mean: escapism is the worst drug. Don't focus on the drugs fuckers, focus on the reason. (You aren't the fuckers)

Please tone it down with the offensive language. In the future, use F**k instead, for instance. Thank you.

[Rick]

Being that we add the meaning to a string of symbols, how is a string of symbols offensive? In your mind, simply substitute the image of a daffodil in place of a f**ker. Easy.

[trojan_libido]

It makes no difference, since we read it in our minds as the uncensored version.

I think I'd like to imagine people going round with fantasy gardens in their heads whenever they read a strong passage lol. Denial is king.

[Joesus]

I thought it was funny..
I don't think a garden is funny.

But that's me. I think people react to words out of habit.

[Phi]

Well it's great to have worker ants until your child becomes one of them. Keep on dragging down the thought process of growth, keep em all talking in circles about everything except the point, and build that pyramid of yours higher until that inevitable collapse. That way, when you fall from the highest point, you'll have more cleaner motive the next time around.

[Joesus]

If you become an intelligent parent you might not be passing on the clone modality of self immersion into distraction and instant gratification.
Parents are the first real authority in a child's eyes. If the parent rode the short bus to school and doesn't pass on the same mentality, children do sometimes have within them the capability to surpass the clone mode of their parents, but then one has to allow for the universal intelligence factor. Or the Karma of the individual. People bring with them a certain amount of baggage when they are born.

[Phi]

I agree entirely with the idea of a parent. I also agree with the baggage part. My idea was more figurative.