Deal or new deal? How the designer drugs trade impacts UK classification laws
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By Laura Hyde
Forty-two new designer drugs, billions of pounds spent on prohibition each year, and just one question – Is the UK Drugs Act still relevant to a modern society? While recent statistics show a significant reduction in overall drug use across the UK, many experts lambast the system, implying that drug classification is dictated by media hype rather than scientific analysis. This leaves many individuals calling for a reform, yet with an influx of legal highs arriving in Europe each year, and a government determined to make stringent cuts to the medicine, science and law enforcement resources, an overhaul may prove to be a complex undertaking.
Drug addiction has caused concern in the UK for over 50 years, but while studies illustrate that the nature of the drugs trade is constantly evolving, the prescribed antidote for the issue has remained largely unchanged since the drugs law was passed in 1971. When the number of controlled substances could be counted on an abacus, and...
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