David Nutt, the scientist sacked as a UK government adviser by the home secretary, on Friday defiantly launched his own independent committee, which he said would provide the definitive scientific verdict on the risks of drugs.
Nutt said his committee was willing to give advice to the government’s Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD), from which he was sacked as chair.
He was dismissed from the post after criticizing politicians for distorting research evidence and claiming alcohol and tobacco were more harmful than some illegal drugs, including LSD, ecstasy and cannabis.
The new committee — called the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs (ISCD) — includes a number of big names in the field and has the potential to embarrass the government, through its determination to make public the evidence on the relative risks and harms of drugs without regard to political sensitivities.
Nutt portrayed the ACMD as something of a lame duck scientifically, following the resignations of five of its members in sympathy with him — four of whom have joined the ISCD.
“It is a body made up of drug treatment people, police and magistrates,” he said.
But the council’s new interim chair, Les Iverson, who was appointed this week, had sent him “a very supportive email,” Nutt added, “saying he welcomed the committee and hopes we can work together.”
The committee will pursue a similar agenda to that which Nutt was sacked for supporting.
“We will undoubtedly pull together an assessment of the science, which is likely to challenge some of the aberrations in the current act,” he said.
“There’s a lot of evidence that MDMA [ecstasy] and related compounds are not class A [the most potentially dangerous drugs]. There’s the evidence we presented that cannabis should stay as class C — I think most people would support that. Possibly the psychedelics are inappropriately positioned in class A. And ketamine may be more dangerous than amphetamines — maybe it shouldn’t be class C,” he said.
The ISCD has 14 members and includes some very senior names in the field. With Nutt at the launch were Les King, who had a 30-year career in the forensic science service, and John Marsden of the Institute of Psychiatry, both of whom resigned from the ACMD, and professor Val Curran, a psychopharmacologist from University College London.
It has funding for the next three years from a hedge fund manager, Toby Jackson, who “wants to give something back,” Nutt said.
In the long term, ISCD hopes for more donations and even contracts from the government to carry out scientific research.
“It will save them money,” Nutt said.
<< The committee has had its first meeting and decided on a plan of work. Apart from assessing the relative harms of well-known drugs, it will look at the risks of new psychoactive substances - or “legal highs” - which can be obtained through websites, and it will focus on ketamine - also known as K or Special K - which is popular with university students. Nutt and Marsden said they felt more comfortable on their independent committee, where they can speak out freely, than on the ACMD. They had been advocating an independent scientific advisery body - which the Dutch have - since 2005, they said. In a statement the Home Office left open the option for the ACMD to take scientific advice from Nutt’s committee. “The Advisery Council on the Misuse of Drugs is a statutory body, advising the government on drug related issues. Its functions are set out in the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 and there are no plans to change that,” it said. “When reviewing drugs ... the ACMD routinely considers evidence and reports from a wide range of sources, including external experts. The ACMD will continue to do so to ensure all its recommendations are based on the most up to date evidence.”
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese