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6 –
Daily Update
– DAY THREE – Wednesday 28 April 2010
‘THE ANTI-SMOKING CAMPAIGNS
tend to
resist tobacco harm reduction because the anti-
tobacco movement is not purely about health,’
Chris Snowdon, author of
Velvet Glove, Iron
Fist: a History of Anti-Smoking
told the
Tobacco
harm reduction: healthier so why not acceptable
session. ‘Opposition is founded on moral and
religious objections as well as health,’ he said.
Anti-tobacco movements went back
centuries, with the substance historically being
seen as ‘ungodly, decadent and depraved’. An
example of tobacco harm reduction from history
was the 18th century ‘snuff’ craze in England,
he said. ‘That should have pacified the anti-
tobacco movement as it didn’t fill the air with
smoke, didn’t carry a fire hazard and it wasn’t as
injurious to health – but it did not. Tobacco
continued to be attacked as an addictive vice.’
Today the moral and puritanical element
remained in anti-tobacco campaigning, as
could be seen with the moves to ban smoking
outdoors – ‘because it’s seen as setting a bad
example to others.’ There was also opposition
to electronic cigarettes on the grounds of
‘mimicking the effects of smoking’, he said.
By 1980 the consenus view among public
health professionals was that any attempt to
produce safer cigarettes would slow down the
quit rate, he told delegates. ‘At a time when
governments were giving out free syringes and
condoms there was a “quit or die” doctrine of
total abstinence towards tobacco that raised
ethical questions.’ The overall aim was a world
without tobacco, but ‘bringing about total
abstinence is easier said than done’ he said.
‘However, “quit or die” lives on.
‘Modern anti-smoking activists are opposed
to harm reduction because they tend to be
idealists who can go on to become zealots’ he
continued. ‘Tobacco harm reduction does not
offer a utopia, nor does it hold to the promise of
destroying the tobacco industry, which is what
the idealists want. The vision offered by harm
reduction is not as tidy or as pure as that
desired by the prohibitionists.’
However, even the tobacco industry’s
fiercest critics couldn’t say that it benefitted
from killing its customers, he said. ‘Good
versus evil is for comic books rather than real
world solutions. If the tobacco industry comes
up with a less hazardous product then that
should be seen as part of the solution instead
of part of the problem.’
Opposition has ‘moral and religious’ basis
Decriminalisation – Portugal shows the way
‘WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENS
in practice
when you decriminalise drugs?’ Alex Stevens
of the University of Kent asked delegates in the
Next generation of drug policy: decriminal-
isation and beyond
session. ‘The argument
that if you decriminalise it, it will lead to
increased drug use is without any evidence,
and Portugal is an example of this.’
Portugal had historically had low levels of
overall drug use but high levels of injecting
drug use and HIV, he said, alongside concern
about the marginalisation of drug users. A
spike in drug-related deaths in the late 1990s
prompted the government to establish a Multi-
Disciplinary Commission on Drug Policy,
which then fed into the 1999 National Drug
Strategy. This emphasised social solidarity be-
tween drug users, who had previously been
marginalised, and the community.
One part of the 1999 strategy was the
decriminalisation of all drugs for personal use
– defined as up to ten days’ supply. It became
an administrative offence, rather than a crim-
inal one, he said, with people referred to a
panel to be assessed whether they were in
need of treatment. The panel had the
ability to impose fines, bans from
public places and to revoke drivers’ –
and other – licenses, but the most
common outcome remained the defer-
ment of any measures. However, de-
criminalisation had gone hand in hand
with expansion of both treatment
services and the social security
system, he stressed.
Since 2001 there had been small
increases in reported illicit drug use
among adults but reduced use among
young people, he said, as well as a
reduced burden of drug offenders on
the criminal justice system and
reduced stigmatisation. There had also been
increases in the amounts of drugs seized and
a reduction in the retail price of drugs.
In 2000 there had been significant
problems with prison overcrowding but since
decriminalisation the number of drug law
offenders had fallen from 44 per cent to 21
per cent. There had also been a fall in the
number of prisoners using heroin in prison
and ‘very significant’ reductions in infectious
disease.
‘Decriminalisation can reduce the infliction
of drug law-related harms,’ he told delegates.
‘It does not necessarily lead to increased
harmful drug use, but treatment availability
and wider social policy are at least as
important as drug laws in determining levels of
drug-related harm.’
Chris Snowdon:
‘...the anti-tobacco
movement is not purely about health.’
Alex Stevens:
‘What actually happens in practice
when you decriminalise drugs?’