I was going to do this story: Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs recommends cannabis stay at Class C, as a satires, but frankly there's no point. Especially now that Brown has announced his intention to reclassify it anyway. It's already a miniature Lehrer moment so why bother?

Here's the thing. I've heard countless stories on prestigious news shows like the Today programme (never afraid to agree with the prejudices of middle-england, like some kind of Yes Minister-style cheerleader for their brand of 'common sense') and the previously sensible Independent newspaper, about how harmful this new 'skunk' that the kids be usin' is all giving them the schizophrenias.

Here's the thing: it's not true. It's demonstrably not true. Here's Ben Goldacre on the initial scare story that the Indie ran to justify it's new anti-weed stance:

"To get their scare figure, The Independent have compared the worst cannabis from the past with the best cannabis of today. But you could have cooked the books in exactly the same way 30 years ago if you’d wanted: in 1975 the weakest herbal cannabis analysed was 0.2%; in 1978 the strongest herbal cannabis was 12%. Oh my god: in just 3 years herbal cannabis has become 60 times stronger.

And in fact, what’s most amazing is that this scare isn’t new. In the US, in the mid 1980s, during Reagan’s “war on drugs”, it was claimed that cannabis was 14 times stronger than in 1970, which rather sets you thinking. If it was 14 times stronger in 1986 than in 1970, and it’s 25 times stronger today than the beginning of the 1990s, does that mean it is now, in fact, 350 times stronger than 1970?

That’s not even a crystal in a plant pot. That’s impossible. That would require more THC to be present in the plant than the total volume of space taken up by the plant itself. That would require matter to be condensed. If I was a physics-minded branding manager, I would suggest Quark Gluon Plasma as the most appropriate street name for this substance: and I look forward to reading about the scare in the Independent tomorrow"

Since then of course, there was the horrifying new story that this 'skunk' stuff causes 40% more (or 40% of, depending which version you hear) of schizophrenia. Despite this being as dodgy as the Independent's figures, this 'fact' now gets repeated ad nauseum in any story about the evil weed. 

Ben again (in the excellently titled article 'Blah blah cannabis blah blah blah'):

"Now I don’t like to carp, but it’s interesting that the Daily Mail got even these basics wrong, under their headline “Smoking just one cannabis joint raises danger of mental illness by 40%”. Firstly “the researchers, from four British universities, analysed the results of 35 studies into cannabis use from around the world. This suggested that trying cannabis only once was enough to raise the risk of schizophrenia by 41%.”

In fact they identified 175 studies which might have been relevant, but on reading them, it turned out that there were just 11 relevant papers, describing seven actual datasets. The Mail made this figure up to “35 studies” by including 24 separate papers which the authors also found on cannabis and depression, although the Mail didn’t mention depression at all.
...

It was also interesting to see how the risk was numerically reported. The most dramatic figure is always the “relative risk increase”, or rather: “cannabis doubles the risk of psychosis”, “cannabis increases the risk by 40%”. Because schizophrenia is comparatively rare, translated this into real numbers this works out - if the figures in the paper are correct, and causality is accepted - that about 800 yearly cases of schizophrenia are attributable to cannabis. This is not belittling the risk, merely expressing it clearly.

But what’s really important, of course, is what you do with this data. Firstly, you can mispresent it, and scare people. Obviously it feels great to be so self-righteous, but people will stop taking you seriously. After all, you’re talking to a population of young people who have worked out that you routinely exaggerate the dangers of drugs, not least of all with the ridiculous “modern cannabis is 25 times stronger” fabrication so beloved by the media and politicians.

And craziest of all is the fantasy that reclassifying cannabis will stop six million people smoking it, and so eradicate those 800 extra cases of psychosis. If anything, for all drugs, increased prohibition may create market conditions where more concentrated and dangerous forms are more commercially viable. We’re talking about communities, and markets, with people in them, after all: not molecules and neuroreceptors."

The fact is that Cannabis has always been a handy scare story. Take a look at this Daily Mirror article from the 30s.

As Michael Schofield, a social psychologist who worked on the Wootton Report and the Government Advisory Committee on Drug Dependence in the 60s, noted in his 1971 book The Strange Case of Pot that although certainly in the short term 'physical effects seem to be negligible' [1], and that 'long-term consumption of canabis in moderate doses has no harmful effects'[2], that the press have always taken an overwhelmingly negative view of the drug, far beyond its actual effects. The reaction to the Wootton Report, which first proposed the classification system in use today, was met with the Daily Express headline 'STORM LOOMS OVER POT SMOKERS CHARTER'[3], and in the House of Commons MPs were scarcely better. Here's Quintin Hogg:

"When I talk to members of my profession [he was a judge] ... this drug is associated in their minds ... with crime, violence and abnormality of one sort or another"

Nothing much changes. There was no evidence that cannabis made you dangerously black  in the 30s, and there's precious little that it poses a huge social harm risk now. And Ben is right when he points out that prohibition is no guarantee of a reduction in use. In Reefer Madness, Eric Schlosser notes.

"there are more people in prison today for violating marijuana laws than at any other time in American history. ... Approximately one-third of the American population over the age of twelve have smoked marijuana at least once. About twenty million Americans smoke it every year. More than two million smoke it every day."[4]

In all, Brown's decision to stand by his previous stance in wanting to reclassify cannabis shows his traditionalism if nothing else. When Callaghan first received the Wootton Report, he deliberately misrepresented it to the house in order that he could ignore its key cannabis recommendation that it be made a class C drug. Clearly the same thing is going on here.

Although it cheered me up no end to see Captain Sensible on the Bad Science forum's response to this whole mess:

"if I hear another reactionary and ignorant knob jockey on the radio trying to convince the world that cannabis needs to be un-reclassified, I'm going to kill something."

It's nice to know you're not alone sometimes isn't it?

FOR SLIGHTLY LESS BONKERS INFO ON DRUGS AND PUBLIC POLICY GO TO TRANSFORM'S BLOG HERE:
http://transform-drugs.blogspot.com/

[1]The Strange Case of Pot, Pelican, 1971, p.40

[3] ibid. p.88

[4] Reefer Madness, Penguin, 2004 p.14

These include FRCAM (Dublin), FRIPH (UK) FACAM (USA) and provost of the Royal College of Alternative Medicine (RCAM Dublin).

The Royal College of Alternative Medicine appears to be little more than a website. It is listed as a company at Companies Registration Office in Dublin but the phone number given is not in use. Fellowship of the RCA is available to buy from the site.

Dr Obi, originally from Nigeria, does not say where he did his doctorate in science (DSc) or when he joined the Royal Institute of Public Health (RIPH). No one was able to confirm whether or not Dr Obi was a member of the RIPH when the Chronicle contacted it.

Dr Obi says he is a member of the Institute of Clinical Research (ICR), a training body based in Maidenhead that sells membership online for £50.

He also says he is a member of the International Stress Management Association, which also sells membership online from as little as £30.

Dr Obi also claims to be a member of the World Medical Association (WMA), which sells annual membership via its website for 37 euros."

Not much of a post I know, but I really wanted to recommend this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2007/nov/16/sciencenews.g2

I don't hang around Bad Science as much as I used to but this is a fantastic, well-written, accessible, concise guide to the current hoo-ha surrounding homeopathy. Go on, have a read.