David Hadorn Writes:
Beyond A Reasonable Doubt Cannabis Is Substantially Less Harmful Than Alcohol Or Tobacco.
June 20-26, 1998 The Listener
New Zealand
editor@listener.co.nz
By David Hadorn M.D.
(Ed. note: David Hadorn is a tireless activist who has shown just
how much one person can do.)
See
New Zealand
Delegate To UN Special Session Has Spoken In Favour Of Cannabis Law Reform, David Hadorn
Reports
and
New Zealand Anti-Prohibitionist
David Hadorn Responds to French President Chirac On "Banning Drugs"
and
David Hadorn Of
The New Zealand Drug Policy Forum Debates Reefer Madness Prohibitionist
and
A Great Interview
With David Hadorn Director of the New Zealand Drug Policy Forum Trust
GONE TO POT
Peter Quin, chief executive of Life the Education Trust, asks (Letters, May 9) "what scientific evidence exists to support Dr Hadorn’s
assertion that marijuana is ‘relatively harmless’?"
See
Is marijuana really
harmless, like everyone has been saying?
Noel O’Hare’s article ("When the smoke clears", March 21) cited a
book, not yet on sale in New Zealand, which comprehensively reviews the scientific
evidence on cannabis and overwhelmingly supports the view I expressed. The Drug Policy
Forum Trust sent a copy of the book, Marijuana Myths,
Marijuana Facts: a Review of the Scientific Evidence, by US professors Lynn Zimmer and
John Morgan, to Quin several weeks before O’Hare’s story appeared. Apparently he
had not read it at the time of his letter.
With regard to the suppressed World Health Organisation’s comparative analysis of
cannabis, alcohol, and tobacco, the WHO did claim, as Quin notes, that this suppression
was due to the "speculative" nature of the comparisons, not to political
pressures. But, as described by the Drug Policy Forum in its final
report, one of the authors of the suppressed report, Dr Robin Room, subsequently confirmed
that cannabis scored no worse than tobacco or alcohol with respect to 10 key health areas.
See
A Major Contribution --
Regulate And Tax Cannabis -
Full Text of New Zealand Drug Policy Forum Final Report
and also
French Report
Says Drinking Worse Than Cannabis After Chirac And Prime Minister Reject Calls To
Decriminalize
Also, the New Scientist (which originally broke the story) rejected the WHO’s claim,
pointing out that many of the anti-cannabis statements contained in the published WHO
report were equally or more "speculative" than those at issue in the unpublished
comparative analysis.
See
High Anxieties -- What the WHO
Doesn't Want You To Know About Cannabis -- New Scientist Special Report
These points notwithstanding, I am delighted to see that Quin has accepted scientific
evidence and scholarly analysis as the legitimate bases for conducting this discussion. Careful examination of the evidence will prove beyond a reasonable doubt
that cannabis is substantially less harmful than alcohol or tobacco.
Next, Quin asks for evidence concerning the rates of drug use in The Netherlands
following liberalisation of cannabis laws in that country in 1976. This evidence is
discussed in Marijuana Myths, Marijuana Facts and official Dutch governmental reports are
cited. There is no serious scientific dispute regarding the fact that both hard drug and
cannabis usage in the Netherlands has fallen and is now substantially lower (particularly
among young people) than in the US, UK, and most other European countries. Although the
denigration of the Netherlands (and particularly Amsterdam) is standard fare for
anti-cannabis campaigners, it is wholly unjustified.
See Legalize
Marijuana and Reduce Use?
New Survey Puts Estimate of Dutch Marijuana Use Even More Below DEAland
and
Comparison of drug
addiction levels in various European countries.and Go
Dutch!
Quin refers to current efforts in the US to arrive at an agreement with the tobacco
companies to pay for tobacco-related health claims, to restrict advertising, and to
contribute to anti-smoking programmes. This phenomenon is indeed relevant to the cannabis
situation, although not in the way Quin thinks. The tobacco
negotiations are made possible only by virtue of the above-ground, regulated nature of the
tobacco market. Imagine trying to negotiate such a deal with illegal drug dealers!
Moreover, Mr Quin’s claim that the New Zealand Government would "risk legal
liability further down the track" is unfounded. If anything, a regulated cannabis
industry might be at risk, not the government. In the meantime, the government would be
reaping tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue every year from regulated cannabis
commerce, much of which could go into effective drug education and treatment programmes.
Quin states that "the law, imperfect as it may be, is society’s principal way
of protecting its members from what is seen to be harmful to them". Really? Why, then, have we not banned tobacco, alcohol, mountain-climbing, bungee
jumping, boxing, glue, petrol, fast cars, aeroplanes, and a whole host of things that can
be, and often are, quite harmful?
Answer: because law enforcement is wholly ineffective at regulating private consensual
behaviour and is therefore used only as society’s last resort for regulating
behaviour.
More fundamentally, does Mr Quin really think the government should protect people from
themselves through coercion and force of law? Isn’t that what education and social
customs are supposed to be for? And aren’t we supposed to be free to make mistakes
and to do inadvisable things, provided we don’t hurt others?
It is time we accepted responsible cannabis use as part of our culture and focused our
efforts on minimising any harms associated with cannabis use. Indeed,
Quin and the Life Education Trust would better serve young people if they were to provide
principles of safe and responsible cannabis use to the teens determined to try cannabis
whether we like it or not—rather than relying solely on tired "just say no"
messages that lack credibility with most young people.
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Supported