Drug abuse in Britain is worse than anywhere else in Europe, according to a new report. Young people in the UK are more likely to take cocaine, Ecstasy and amphetamine than those in any other country on the Continent, it said. But cannabis use is declining.
Young Britons are using cocaine in quantities and with a frequency unmatched anywhere else in the world apart from the US, the report found. One in 20 schoolchildren of 15 and 16 - around 200,000 teenagers - have used the drug, it said.
The analysis, by the European Union's drug agency, also pointed to levels of deaths from drugs that are higher here than in any other major nation in the EU. Only four small European countries - Luxembourg, Estonia, Norway and Denmark - lose a higher proportion of their young people in drug-related deaths, the report said.
Deaths linked to drug abuse in Britain are, the figures suggest, running at double the rate of those in Germany and four times those in France.
The use of cannabis, says the report, is showing signs of decline in the UK, however.
In the context of this report little comfort.
1 comment:
Drugs are good for you, they are fun. They give you a buzz, make you feel good. That is why drugs are so popular, that is why drug eradication programmes fail so abysmally, as they fail to recognise the reality.
Remember the ecstasy campaign? It failed before it even started. It claimed people were dying like flies. They weren't. People looked around the clubs, talked to their mates, saw the campaign was talking rubbish and carried on popping the little white pills.
Yes, a few people did die, but it was due to other causes, but not related to ecstasy. Where clubbers did die, it was contaminated ecstasy or an allergic reaction.
The Police like to give the impression they are winning the drugs war. They are not. They like to give publicity to huge drug seizures. These are a minuscule drop in the ocean. Look at the street prices. Drugs are dirt cheap. The reason they are so cheap is because the market is oversupplied, classic supply and demand.
Where there is dealing, the Police fail to act.
There is open dealing in Aldershot. The Police have been told when and where. They turn a blind eye.
In Farnborough, there is a regular drop off within and in the vicinity of George V Playing Fields. A parcel is deposited in the bushes. Within minutes, some one picks it up. One of the houses at the bottom of The Grove, a regular business flow.
We have no effective drug programmes for junkies who wish to kick the habit. Why? Cost.
But even if we did, it does not solve the underlying problem of drug abuse and alcohol consumption – escapism.
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