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Ecstasy and Amphetamines - Global Survey 2003
United Nations Drug Report “Disappointing” Say Critics
Yesterday (September 23, 2003) the United Nations Office on Drugs
and Crime released its report
Ecstasy and Amphetamines - Global Survey 2003.
The report estimates that worldwide 7.7 million people used the drug
ecstasy from 2000-2001.
This figure is approximately one-half the number of people who used
cocaine during that time period, and approximately one-fourth fewer
people than used heroin during that same time period.
According to the report, ecstasy users risk “suffering
the effects of
early decline in mental function and memory, or Alzheimer-type
symptoms.”
The report was released just weeks after
scientists at
Johns Hopkins University retracted
their research findings that suggested that a single evening's
use of ecstasy could cause permanent brain damage and Parkinson's
disease. The scientists
admitted that they utilized the wrong drug in their studies.
The UN report makes no mention of the retracted studies.
According to Richard Glen Boire, legal counsel for the Center for
Cognitive Liberty and Ethics, a US-based law and policy group
focused on protecting of freedom of thought, the UN report is also
disappointing for its adoption of US government rhetoric.
“It’s inaccurate to equate any and all
use
of ecstasy with
abuse,”
said attorney Boire. “During Alcohol Prohibition did evening wine
drinkers all become abusers?” he asked, continuing, “prohibition is
a political label, not a magic wand that transforms all use into
abuse.”
According to the Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics, equating
drug use with drug abuse not only leads to bad social policies, it
infringes on the fundamental right of adults to mediate their own
mental processes.
“It used to be that governments banned books because of how they
changed the way that people thought,” says Boire. “Today it’s drugs
– both legal and illegal – that are changing the way that people
think. Just as it was wrong for the government to censor books, it’s
equally wrong for the government to censor cognition itself by
making peaceful people criminals just for taking a drug like
ecstasy.”
For more
information:
Richard Glen Boire, J.D.
Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethic (ccle)
www.cognitiveliberty.org
231 G. Street, No. 7
Davis, CA 95616
Ph & fax: 530-750-7912
e-mail:
rgboire@cognitiveliberty.org
ABOUT
THE CCLE
The Center for Cognitive Liberty & Ethics (CCLE) is a nonprofit law
and policy institute working to advance sustainable social policies
that protect freedom of thought. We work to promote public
awareness and legal recognition of cognitive liberty -- the right of
each individual to think independently, to have decision-making
authority over matters affecting his or her mind, and to engage in
the full spectrum of possible thought. Read our full
Mission Statement
See Also
CCLE Entheogen and Drug Policy Project
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