Success as five legal highs become banned substances

Five legal high drugs have been banned following the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs’ recommendation that these substances were made illegal for 12 months.

Lynne Featherstone, the drug minister, said that she had accepted the government’s drug advisors’ recommendation regarding the temporary ban to enable a full study of how harmful these drugs are to be carried out.

One of the drugs that has been banned ‒ ethylphenidate ‒ has been used in the UK as an alternative to cocaine. Users inject this drug, which has been marketed under various names including Nopaine, Gogaine, Banshee Dust and Burst, and Police Scotland claims that this drug has been responsible for the majority of hospital admissions caused by legal high use.

The 12-month temporary ban will mean that anyone discovered making, supplying or bringing the drugs into the country can spend up to 14 years in prison and have to pay a limitless fine. Possession of the five banned substances is not illegal; however, police have the authority to search and detain anyone thought to be carrying them and to seize the drugs.Campaigners for drug reform believe that the temporary ban will leave the authorities playing catch-up with the people making the substances and argued that the only solution is wholesale drug reform.

Transform’s Danny Kushlick said: “This is the opposite of control and regulation. It’s fuelling anarchy in the market and we need to look at regulating frameworks for more benign drugs.”