Drug classification blah blah blah

everyones talking about it so this seemed like a good moment to flag up an article on the classification I had published in Drugs and Alcohol Today in October, that, because of the long run in on these sorts of things, had managed to slip out into print unnoticed by the usually foolproof Transform blog media scanner.

Published in the 'policy forum' section the article it is billed as an 'exchange of views' on the subject of drug classification (aka 'drug scheduling') between myself and Ted Leggett from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime in Vienna. We have engaged in the policy forum previously on the subject of cannabis potency but on this occasion we both adopt critical positions; Ted considers the methodological problems with attempting to rank drug harms, with particular reference to last year's high profile Lancet paper, and that graph, whilst I make a more wide ranging critique on the entire intellectual, ethical and empirical basis of a harm based hierarchy of criminal penalties. Worth a look.

you know, that graph