Legal high laws around the world

Synthetic drugs have been a contentious issue around the world, often made of legal chemicals synthetic drugs have in many cases been marketed as ‘bath salts’ and ‘incense’ their purpose is in many cases to replicate the effects of illegal drugs. For instance synthetic cannabinoid have ingredients which mimic the active ingredient in marijuana (tetrahydrocannabinol) unlike marijuana however they are considered legal. The reasons why someone may decide to use a ‘legal high’ vary though it generally revolves round the fact that it’s not technically illegal, they are more accessible that illicit drugs, they don’t show up on drug tests and generally are cheaper than illicit drugs.

For years governments across the globe have been trying to figure out what to do with synthetic highs. The UK has been one country which has been trying to outlaw some of these drugs such as BZP, GBL and ‘Spice’. The previous bans of legal synthetic drugs in the UK were mainly due to the deaths which they caused in the UK with both BZP and GBL being linked to several deaths. The same is true with Mephedrone where many deaths were blamed on the drug, though there is no concrete evidence that Mephedrone alone caused the deaths reported in the media.

The positive effects of the ban on ‘Legal Highs’ is questionable for instance when the UK government announced the upcoming ban some suppliers of these ‘legally high’ drugs reported a 300% increase in sales which led to concerns that people were stockpiling the drug. It is also still hard to ascertain whether the ban and the media frenzy around them has merely had the effect of just promoted synthetic drugs and driven them underground or whether there is an actual decrease in the demands for these drugs. There is very little research done about the success of ban on synthetic drugs. One is a very small study by researchers at the University of Belfast where they interviewed 23 mephedrone users in a 2 month period; their study showed that in the immediate aftermath of the ban there was no significant decrease in Mephedrone use with 21 out of the 23 interviewed having used Mephedrone after the ban. Another study done by mixmag at the beginning of 2011 interviewed 2500 night clubbers out of those 75% said that they have used Mephedrone since it was banned and 10% even admitted to increasing the amount they take since the ban.

The other problem also being that though governments can ban substances there are always new substances being brought to market which replace those recently banned as Jeremy Morris of the Johnson County sheriff office says "You take one out and another just pops up". When mephedrone back in April 2010 was banned new drugs started gaining more popularity almost immediately in the UK such as ‘Ivory wave’. Critics of the ban therefore make the argument that because of the prevalence of new drugs being found to take the place of banned drugs it means banning legal highs becomes obsolete. As Dr Max Pemberton said "since the ban (mephedrone) yet more legal highs such as ‘Ivory Wave’ have flooded the market to fill the place once occupied by Mephedrone"( http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthadvice/maxpemberton/8050611/Vict...).

The fact that new legal highs take the place of old ones which have been banned does concern the European Union, the UN in a 2010 report describe Europe as ‘the most innovate place for new drugs’. The European Union currently employs an early warning system, run by the EMCDDA (European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction) which gives detailed information about new synthetic drugs coming to market and also provides risk assessments for the council if requested. According to the EMCDDA The number of drugs being brought to attention through the early warning system in 2009 was 24 substances compared to 2010 where that number nearly doubled reaching 40 substances. The EU’s overall ‘legal high’ response is quite slow due to the fact that there are so many actors involved in policy making within the EU and decision making is relatively slow. Normally individual European Union (EU) countries ban drugs or impose a temporary ban before the EU gets round to banning a substance. For instance the EU banning Mephedrone was relatively slow by the time the EU wide ban on Mephedrone came into effect 15 individual EU member states had already banned it. A report for the EU commission highlighted the fact that some member states felt this process was way too slow one option which came out of the EU commission report in 2011 to improve this was to use an European wide emergency temporary ban similar to what happens in the UK and Germany to allow a proper risk assessment.

The individual response to new legal highs differs from country to country within the EU. In Britain prior to 2010 the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) would conduct an investigation into new drugs and then recommend to the government the drugs which should be banned the government would then put it to parliament. Campaigners argued that this approach in tackling new drugs was often slow and was often behind the market with new drugs replacing the old ones even before parliament had banned them. The system in recent years has been changed though due to the need to investigate the harms of new legal highs. Now the Home office can ban drugs immediately for 12 months while the ACMD decides whether the drug should be permanently banned or not. This is very similar to Germany where emergency regulations can be used to make a drug illegal for one year to give toxicologists a chance to examine the drug and decide how dangerous it is.

That is one of the fundamental problems with new legal highs a lot of them are untested on humans and it means that the long term effects of using them are unknown and why many believe the one year temporary ban is a good idea. Many of these new synthetic drugs are created based on journal articles by scholars who are researching mind-alternating substances the problem being that most of the substances that are used have not gone through proper testing. Dr David Nichols is one scholar who worries about the substances he writes in journal articles being used as synthetic drugs. The concern he has stems from a lack of knowledge about the effects of the substances he writes about as he has only ever tested the substances on animals.

Other EU countries have also taken steps on some drugs such as France who have recently made ‘Poppers’ (Amyl Nitrate) a prescription only drug. This is similar to Denmark who have had ‘poppers’ banned since 2004. ‘Poppers’ though are very widespread throughout the rest of Europe especially in the UK where ‘poppers’ are so wide spread that they are available on Amazon.co.uk. Neither is there wide spread support in most countries for them to be banned with several studies concluding that the health effects on the individual and society of ‘poppers’ is minimal compared to alcohol and tobacco.

Ireland have been attempting to curtail the use of ‘legal high’ by in 2010 banning mephedrone, ‘spice’ and substances which mimic cannabis and cocaine. ‘Head Shops’ (Sell legal highs) can be closed down unless they can prove that they are not selling substances which are on the banned substance list. More than one year has passed since Irelands laws on ‘legal highs’ were passed and so far there does not seem to be much change based on a 2011 EU commission survey which shows that Ireland has the highest number of Synthetic drug users in Europe at 16% that is 11% higher than the EU average. To add to that the fear that the banning of’ head shops’ would just lead to certain drugs being traded on the underground seems to of come true too. An independent article in August 2010 reported that medical staff in Ireland have reported an increase in ‘head shop’ drug related admissions.

Poland recently has also taken a similar stance to Ireland with a new law comprising of two articles which modifies two acts. Article 1 modifies the ‘Act on Counteracting Drug Addiction’ making it illegal to advertise, introduce or manufacture synthetic drugs meaning that it makes it hard for ‘head shops’ to survive in Poland. The second article (Article 2) creates a similar situation to Germany and the UK it modifies the ’Act on State Sanitary Inspection’ and allows the government to temporarily ban new substances for 18 ^{months whilst further tests are conducted on the substance.}

In America a lot of states have different laws on the use of synthetic drugs it has over the past couple of years become a big issue. According to the Bloomberg Businessweek the synthetic drugs business generates roughly $5 billion in sales annually. If Jeffrey Miron (Havard economics department) and the Cato Institute’s statistics are correct then the legal high industry in America accounts for about 5% of the recreational drug market and that share is increasing rapidly. Currently 20 states including Florida and North Dakota have passed emergency bans on ‘bath salts’ containing methylenedioxypyrovalerone and mephedrone. There have also been calls for ‘bath salts’ to be federally banned with Senator Charles Schumer leading the way saying that ‘legal highs’ were nothing "more than legally sanctioned narcotics".

Australia also has a federal system and it means bans can come from the national and state level.The national government has in the past been accused of being slow to act especially when Kronic became a big issue. The Western Australian Mental Health Minister; Helen Mortan when talking about banning Kronic called it a reluctance by federal government to tackle the issue in a timely manner.Advocates who say the federal government is slow to act point to the fact that Kronic and other synthetic cannabinoids were banned in Western Australia and New South Wales before the federal government decided to rush through a ban. In fact it was so rushed that they only gave producers of synthetic cannabinoids 12 hours notice forcing many to sell their stock at half price.

In Australia the list of drugs banned comes from a national list where the schedule I on the National Narcotic Drugs Act 1967 has over 70 chemicals on it. As well as the national list there is also a state based list that includes national banned substances but also substances which each individual state believes merits a ban. One example is New South Wales where the Drug Misuse and Trafficking Act of 1985 has over 230 substances in it.

Across the Tasman in New Zealand cannabinoid based ‘Legal Highs’ have in the past been legal and the companies producing them have had little more than some self regulations, they have in the past been able to market their products in the media such as in newspapers and on the radio. That however has changed after one producer of a ‘legal high’ drug was tested and found to contain phenazepam (classed as classified medicine) and this has created a huge media frenzy in New Zealand. After the revelations of classified medicine in the ‘legal high‘ drugs the top 8 producers of ‘legal highs’ met to try and appease the public and media by announcing that they would be testing all imports to make sure there was no contamination and would also stop all advertisement in the media. Health Experts and MP’s however rejected this saying it was too little too late. It has meant that the New Zealand government has put to vote new amendments to the Misuse of Drugs act which will mean in the future ‘legal high’ producers will have to prove that their drugs are safe before being sold, not sell legal highs in petrol stations or where alcohol is being sold and the product must be in a child proof container with a health warning.

Singapore which is often thought of as being tough on drugs due to its mandatory death sentence for the trafficking of certain drugs has when it comes the ‘legal highs’ been a bit behind many other countries. Mephedrone, BZP and TFMPP in Singapore was banned near the end of 2010(Behind Europe and some Asian countries) whilst other substances related to synthetic drugs which have become illegal in other countries such as JWH-018(been illegal in some countries since 2009) and CP-47 are according to the CNB (Central Narcotics Bureau) website not on the banned list. Both these substances are used for in the creation of synthetic drugs and have been banned in many parts of Europe and Asia such as in South Korea and Germany.

There is a lot of hype around ‘legal highs’ and that hype is primarily based around the media for instance the media made a big deal about the death of Louis Wainwright and Nicholas Smith with the media linking the deaths of the two teenagers to mephedrone. The deaths of those two increased the calls to have it banned, however it later transpired that Louis Wainwright and Nicholas Smith did not take any mephedrone. The widespread use of synthetic drugs which is painted by the media is also questionable an European commission survey of 15-24 olds found that over 90% of those questioned have never taken a ‘legal high’ drugs yet newspapers like the Daily Mail using words such as saying mephedrone "continues to flood the market" and "sweeping through clubs" to paint a picture of a sort of epidemic.