Drugs - Without the Hot Air: Minimising the Harms of Legal and Illegal Drugs

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

Winner of:
Transmission Prize for the Communication of Ideas 2014
Highly Commended, Popular Medicine, British Medical Association awards From health to family to society, this informative exploration takes an evidence-based view of all the factors involved in drug use. Applying the same objective criteria to legal and illegal substances, an argument is made that legality is not a clear measure for harm. Tackling a variety of questions, such as Which is more harmful--Ecstasy or alcohol? Can addiction be cured? and Does the "War on Drugs" have serious unintended effects that can hurt children? , this analysis equips readers with the ability to make educated decisions regarding drugs both personally and in their communities. Broadening the scope of the discussion, a framework is explored for formulating national drug policies that will minimize a myriad of harms--social, medical, criminal, financial, and environmental.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• 1 Why I had to write this book (p. 1)
• Who this book is for (p. 6)
• 2 Is ecstasy more dangerous than horse riding? (p. 9)
• Go compare (p. 10)
• Equasy (p. 13)
• What is ecstasy? (p. 14)
• Does ecstasy kill? (p. 15)
• What are the other harms of ecstasy? (p. 16)
• Ecstasy in the media (p. 17)
• Ecstasy: a moral issue (p. 20)
• Why measuring drug harms frightens politicians (p. 22)
• Ecstasy and post-traumatic stress disorder (p. 24)
• 3 How can we measure the harms done by drugs? (p. 30)
• Why measure? (p. 30)
• Sixteen different sorts of harm (p. 32)
• Multi-criteria decision analysis (p. 35)
• The expert panel (p. 36)
• Which drugs did the expert panel consider? (p. 38)
• Rating the drugs (p. 39)
• Weighting the scores (p. 41)
• Results (p. 43)
• Limitations of the model (p. 45)
• Critical reception (p. 45)
• Conclusion (p. 46)
• Reviewing a drug's Class? The case of ketamine (p. 47)
• 4 Why do people take drugs? (p. 51)
• How drugs evolved (p. 51)
• Chemicals in the human brain (p. 51)
• A typical day without drugs (p. 52)
• What is a drug? (p. 54)
• 1 Opioids - opium, heroin, methadone, ... (p. 55)
• 2 Stimulants or "uppers" - cocaine, amphetamine, ... (p. 56)
• 3 Depressants or "downers" - alcohol, benzodiazepines, GHB (p. 57)
• 4 Psychedelics - LSD, mushrooms, ... (p. 57)
• Less easily-classified drugs (p. 58)
• A typical day on drugs (p. 60)
• A brief history of drug use (p. 61)
• Why do people take drugs? (p. 65)
• Why this matters (p. 68)
• 5 Cannablis, and why did Queen Victoria take it? (p. 72)
• Cannabis as hemp (p. 72)
• Cannabis as a drug (p. 73)
• What are the benefits? (p. 74)
• What are the harms? (p. 75)
• Cannabis routes of use (p. 76)
• Is skunk more harmful than hash? (p. 78)
• Why did cannabis stop being seen as a medicine? (p. 79)
• Medicinal cannabis use in the UK today (p. 82)
• Conclusion (p. 84)
• Does cannabis cause schizophrenia? (p. 85)
• 6 If alcohol were discovered today, would it be legal? (p. 91)
• How the drinks industry influences alcohol policy (p. 93)
• How can we reduce the harm done by alcohol? (p. 104)
• Conclusion (p. 109)
• 7 "Meow meow" - should mephedrone have been banned? (p. 114)
• "Meow meow" (p. 114)
• What is mephedrone and why is it called plant food? (p. 116)
• The harms and benefits of taking mephedrone (p. 117)
• Why was mephedrone banned? (p. 118)
• The designer drug problem (p. 120)
• Alternative approaches (p. 121)
• The very least we ought to know (p. 123)
• Conclusion (p. 124)
• The original cathinone: khat (p. 126)
• 8 What is addiction? Is there an "addictive personality"? (p. 132)
• Addiction in history (p. 133)
• The brain mechanisms of addiction (p. 135)
• What is tolerance and why does it occur? (p. 139)
• Withdrawal and craving (p. 141)
• Diagnosing addiction (p. 143)
• Is there an "addictive personality"? (p. 145)
• Protective factors - why some people don't get addicted to drugs (p. 148)
• Conclusion (p. 149)
• How does neuroimaging work? (p. 150)
• 9 Can addiction be cured? (p. 155)
• Introduction (p. 155)
• Case study 1 Tony Adams and alcohol (p. 155)
• Case study 2 Pete Doherty, heroin and crack (p. 156)
• Case study 3 Amy Winehouse (p. 156)
• Psychological treatments (p. 157)
• Pharmacological substitutes (p. 159)
• Other pharmacological treatments (p. 160)
• What is heroin? (p. 161)
• Why do people take heroin, and why can't they stop? (p. 162)
• Using heroin to treat heroin addicts (p. 164)
• Advantages and disadvantages of methadone treatment (p. 164)
• Buprenorphine - a better solution? (p. 166)
• Evaluating treatments (p. 167)
• The Portuguese experiment (p. 170)
• Preventing addiction (p. 172)
• Conclusion (p. 173)
• 10 Cocaine - from chewing to crack (p. 177)
• Routes of use and main associated harms (p. 177)
• Why are drugs used in different forms? (p. 179)
• Kinetics and dynamics of addiction (p. 179)
• From chewing to crack: the history of cocaine (p. 181)
• Why is crack twice as addictive as cocaine? (p. 186)
• Conclusion (p. 187)
• The international damage done by cocaine (p. 188)
• 11 Why was smoking banned in public places? (p. 192)
• The 2007 ban on smoking in public places in the UK (p. 192)
• What is tobacco? (p. 193)
• What are tobacco's harms and benefits? (p. 194)
• How do we know that smoking causes lung cancer? (p. 197)
• Why is smoking so addictive? (p. 199)
• Public-health responses and industry resistance (p. 202)
• Consequences of the UK smoking ban (p. 204)
• Freedom and choice (p. 206)
• Conclusion (p. 208)
• 12 Prescription drugs (p. 216)
• What are benzodiazepines and how do they work? (p. 217)
• What are the benefits and harms of benzodiazepines? (p. 217)
• Antidepressants and SSRIs (p. 221)
• Painkillers (p. 224)
• The pharmaceutical industry and science (p. 225)
• The mental-health epidemic (p. 227)
• Informed consent (p. 229)
• Conclusion (p. 230)
• 13 Can drugs improve performance? (p. 232)
• Muscle and power (p. 232)
• Other drugs in sport (p. 237)
• Improving mental performance - cognition enhancers (p. 238)
• Conclusion (p. 244)
• 14 Psychedelics - should scientists try LSD? (p. 247)
• How do psychedelics work? (p. 247)
• The discovery of LSD (p. 248)
• LSD and psychiatry (p. 250)
• Set and setting (p. 251)
• LSD leaves the laboratory (p. 252)
• What are the harms of LSD and psychedelics? (p. 254)
• What are the benefits of psychedelics? (p. 255)
• Should scientists take LSD? (p. 256)
• Mushrooms and other psychedelics (p. 258)
• Why were magic mushrooms banned in the UK? (p. 260)
• Conclusion (p. 261)
• 15 The War on Drugs, and drugs in war (p. 264)
• The other "war on drugs" (p. 264)
• Amphetamines and war (p. 265)
• The aims of the War on Drugs (p. 267)
• A Has the War on Drugs reduced supply? (p. 269)
• B Has the War on Drugs reduced demand? (p. 271)
• C Has the War on Drugs minimised harm? (p. 273)
• Why are we still at war? (p. 280)
• What are the alternatives? (p. 282)
• Comparing the harms of cannabis and prison (p. 283)
• 16 The future of drugs (p. 292)
• Genetic sequencing (p. 292)
• What are the risks of genetic sequencing? (p. 295)
• Treating addiction (p. 296)
• Learning and unlearning (p. 297)
• New drugs research (p. 299)
• The Brain Science, Addiction and Drugs Foresight programme (p. 300)
• What sort of future do we want? (p. 304)
• 17 What should I tell my kids about drugs? (p. 307)
• Young people and drugs (p. 307)
• 1 Alcohol and tobacco are drugs (p. 308)
• 2 All drugs can potentially cause harm (p. 309)
• 3 Tell your kids about drugs from an early age (p. 309)
• 4 Never inject (p. 310)
• 5 Don't use solvents (p. 310)
• 6 Don't take drink and drugs at the same time (p. 310)
• 7 A criminal record could ruin your career (p. 311)
• 8 Find good sources of advice (p. 312)
• 9 If you do take drugs, be clear why (p. 312)
• 10 If you do get into trouble with drugs, get help quickly (p. 313)
• 11 If you use drugs, don't let them interfere with school (p. 314)
• Butane and other solvents (p. 315)
• URLs (p. 317)
• Index (p. 326)