Q&A on 'legal highs'- ask a drugs expert your questions now!

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If someone wants to use a drug they will use a drug. Illegalisation of research chemicals and legal highs will not prevent usage, the same people will be using the same class except obtaining it illegally. It won't be before long that an inactive prodrug of some drugs are available, that can be obtained legally and converted to the active compound at home. And the process starts again.

Reply 81

HandsomeRakk

I wonder what it take before the UK Government start to open there stupid minds that the "war on drugs" failed 70 years ago. Even the US at this point has started to stop with the stupidity and now they are making amazing breakthroughs in using MDMA (yeah that stuff people take a raves) to be up to 80% effective at treating PTSD at therapeutic doses.
Even Nick Clegg supports the view that stopping the war on drugs is the way forward. We have sorted them into classes of punishment even though something like amphetamines which are extremely addictive and easily abused with many recorded deaths every year, is in a lower class than a drug like LSD which no one has ever overdosed on and has shown to not have negative effects in anyway when treat with responsibility.
We are 5-10 years behind the rest of the world with using THC (cannabis) to treat a literal **** ton of problems without causing negative side effects and severely impacting the individual .
It's got to the point where the UK Government forces the Health minster David Nutt to stand down after he published a relevant harm document for drugs backed by strong scientific evidence yet as it didn't support the views of the Government he was literally removed from parliament. This country needs to sort it's **** out and get out of the standard old british stubborn views.

Reply 82

alexs2602

Original post by JordanL_

The bill shuts down headshops selling regulated products, where the manufacturers could be held accountable for the purity and composition, and forces people to buy from illegal suppliers.

There is an abundance of research which shows conclusively that banning drugs stops nobody from using them. ****, you don't even need research, because this cancerous piece of legislation has already been tried in Ireland and it had EXACTLY THE RESULT I JUST SAID IT WOULD HAVE.

This law is about appealing to idiot voters with their heads up their arses, it has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with reducing harm, because we already know for a fact that it's not going to do that.

What do you mean regulated products? Because that may simply be not true. I started watching
this documentary where this is demonstrably not true. The headshop owner had his own line of legal highs where apparently he would increase the strength, likely of the synthetic canniboids especially, to increase sales. Very little difference between him and a street drug dealer. But that's the issue. You do need regulation. I agree with you otherwise.

Reply 83

username1204031

Original post by alexs2602

Sorry, regulated was probably the wrong choice of words.

I meant to say that the vendors and manufacturers can be held accountable. The headshop owner is going to sell you the exact synthetic cannabinoids he tells you he's selling, and he's not going to add in anything else, because if something goes wrong and it's found out that he's cut his product, he goes to jail.

When the dealers are illegal, they can't be held accountable. Illegal dealers will sell you stuff that's stronger than what you're after, and they'll cut it with all sorts of ****, because nobody knows who they are and they won't be held responsible for killing you.

Reply 84

alexs2602

Original post by JordanL_

There's a greater ability for regulation but I'm not sure just how regulated it was. The great thing about online shops that sold legal highs was that they were self-regulating to a degree. With accountability due to reviews, even GCMS testing.

Very true about illegal drug dealers.

Reply 85

cupcakes87

[video="youtube;r5OtFosqtbM"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5OtFosqtbM[/video]

Reply 86

quasa

Entertainment Forum Helper

Original post by OwenBowdenJones

Hi Quasa,

Drug problems are definitely a healthcare matter, but no only. At the clinic I work, we use a model often called bio-psycho-social. That means helping someone with drug problems in three ways. Firstly thinking about the medical (bio) needs- these might be detoxifying someone from a drug they have become dependent on, or offering treatment for cravings. The 'psycho' is for psychological approaches- these help the person improve their motivation to make the changes they want. Finally, the social refers to the broader environment- somewhere to live, having something meaningful to do.

Only by combining all three approaches do you tend to see sustained recovery.

tbh, I completely agree with incorporating a bi-socio-psycho model for addiction and all mental health disorders tbh. the main gripe I have is with the way the NHS in general is run but economists rather than healthcare professional. I reckon mr hunt probably doesnt know the difference between prostate and acamprosate. (fyi to lay people- look it up major differences)

Reply 87

xyz9856

Original post by HandsomeRakk

LSD has negative effects. Have you never heard of the vivid flashbacks people get? Very traumatic to some. I realise the plasma half life of LSD is not long however I know of a certain individual that annually receives flashbacks. I think we'd be better off with regulated drugs instead of using the law to ignore the problem,

2characters

Reply 88

itsmeleonie

Original post by quasa

healthcare professionals should be in charge of healthcare matters: not some jumped up grammar school twit with an economics degree from oxbridge who doesnt even know what hypertension is

preach

Reply 89

Kurogane

Does anyone know if the ban will also prohibit the purchase and selling of Salvia Divinorum seeds, as well as the growing of them?

Reply 90

cattubato

Original post by AshEntropy

I remember learning about Professor Nutt's graph in A Level Biology.

really annoys me that anabolic steroids is right of khat...

Reply 91

alexs2602

Original post by xyz9856

2characters

That's a myth.

Reply 92

username1204031

Original post by Kurogane

Does anyone know if the ban will also prohibit the purchase and selling of Salvia Divinorum seeds, as well as the growing of them?

Not the purchase, only supply, import, export or production.

As for Salvia Divinorum seeds? Nobody can really say, because this law is such a monumental piece of **** that nobody, not the police or the Home Office, actually know what it bans. I wouldn't risk it, because the definition is probably vague enough to cover it. Not that this legislation is ever actually going to be enforced.

Original post by alexs2602

That's a myth.

Not entirely. I believe you can have PTSD-style flashbacks as the result of a bad trip, but that's PTSD. HPPD is also a thing.

I was told by a PCSO that I'd never be able to drive after taking LSD because it stays in your body for your whole life and you can start tripping at any time without warning :angry:

Perpetuating blatant lies like this just makes the problem worse if anything, because people end up not believing a word they're told.

Reply 93

xyz9856

Original post by alexs2602

That's a myth.

Original post by JordanL_

Not entirely. I believe you can have PTSD-style flashbacks as the result of a bad trip, but that's PTSD. HPPD is also a thing.

HPPD is very different to a LSD flashback.
The individual describes the way flashbacks come on like this: "being reminded of a memory by a smell". No control for a short period of time. Its not so much visual.

Flashbacks 'can' be a result of taking too much acid, or bad acid that contains adulterants. Im not sure whether a bad trip can influence it.

Reply 94

drbluebox

Original post by Puddles the Monkey

Sure, but the issue with some new legal highs is that they're often new substances with no data *at all* on how they affect people short term and long term. At least with established drugs we do have decades of people taking them, although with substances like MDMA we're only just starting to find out what the long term effects might be. Really we need to do some proper scientific research/trials in to all these substances so we know what the effects are.

That's why I'm in favour of regulating the recreational drug industry - one of the best things about living in the UK/EU is that I can walk in to a pharmacy and know that every packet of medicine is regulated and contains exactly what it says it does, with a list of side effects and contra-indications. It should be the same for recreational drugs.

Then we can deal with the social and health implications of drug abuse separately.

:beard:

Not read rest of thread yet but I know for a fact that just because something is over the counter doesn't mean its safe as my father became seriously ill when I was a small child due it it and main reason he is unable to work 25 years later in fact I always remember in the late 90s a new drug was announced and my dad wrote letters to the manufacter saying how it will be misused by illegal drug users (it is able to be mixed with illegal drugs before injecting it to boost its performance) and got letters back sayng he was scaremongering.

Less than a year later it was over the news about it being withdrawn and he got a letter from the manufacturer begging him to destroy previous letters they sent him!

You have him to thank for a lot of things common in drugs today, things like information leaflets were meant to be put in prescription boxes before then but so often it was never done until he campaigned, and before he did so even though "side effects" were listed it was rare to see things like "don't take more than recommended dose" Hey even the limits on amount of paracetemol that began in the late 90s was my dads idea and MP's like other changes took it as their own and got praise for it.

He has won small awards over the years and even been offered bribes from the big drug companies to stop his charity work as it costs them money!

Reply 95

lehcarbat

Original post by Kurogane

Does anyone know if the ban will also prohibit the purchase and selling of Salvia Divinorum seeds, as well as the growing of them?

Purchase, selling and growing of salvia are all now illegal. Possession is ambiguous

Reply 96

username1204031

Original post by lehcarbat

Purchase, selling and growing of salvia are all now illegal. Possession is ambiguous

Not necessarily if we're talking about seeds. The seeds themselves might not be psychoactive. One of many loopholes in this horrible law. Some legal highs manufacturers are looking at producing inactive products that don't become psychoactive until you mix them, or something like that, so they'd be able to sell these non-psychoactive substances which you make psychoactive yourself after you buy them.

I still wouldn't risk it though, you're completely at the mercy of the police, and they know as much as we do about what's banned and what isn't. They've already been confiscating poppers, which are specifically exempt from the act. It's ****ing madness.