Alcohol Causes More Harm Than Crack

From a November 1, 2010 Sky News online article by Graham Fitzgerald
(nice accompanying 30 second video!)

Alcohol causes more widespread harm than drugs like heroin or crack cocaine, according to a study published in respected medical journal The Lancet. [Full text of this article is free upon registration]

The research evaluates recreational drugs on a wide range of factors, weighing up the mental and physical damage users suffer alongside crime and costs to the community.

It found the most dangerous drugs to individual users were heroin, crack cocaine and crystal meth.

But when all factors were taken into account alcohol was found to be most harmful, followed by heroin and crack.

Ecstasy and LSD were found to be the least damaging.

The study ranks alcohol as three times as harmful as cocaine or tobacco and eight times more harmful than ecstasy.

It also contradicts the Home Office’s [This is a British government agency ]decision to make so-called legal high mephedrone a Class B drug, saying it is only one-fifth as damaging as alcohol.

The study was led by drugs expert Professor David Nutt**, who has hit the headlines before for arguing that the current approach to regulating recreational drugs is fundamentally flawed…….

Another summary of this article may be found here (Science Daily article: Alcohol “Most Harmful Drug” According to Multivariate Analysis)

 

** Wikipedia article about David Nutt

David Nutt’s blog

Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs