Drugs in 2010: The Year of the Nutt?

In the face of the UK government’s current drug policy of scare tactics and ignorance, it looks like David Nutt, the ex-chief drug advisor who was fired last year, is making a comeback.

The BBC reported on Nutt’s ‘powerful grouping’, the Independent Council on Drug Harms, to be launched at a meeting in January 2010.  Dose Nation was one of the first to praise Prof Nutt’s new drugs group, which will rival the official Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD).

Then Sphere reported on a Telegraph article that slipped under the radar during Christmas. Professor Nutt is working at Imperial College to develop an alcohol substitute that avoids drunkenness and hangovers.

While I’m skeptical about society substituting a valium-type drug for alcohol, it would be an improvement on the fairly dire situation we’re in with alcohol abuse today. More promising is Nutt’s refusal to back down when it comes to providing independent scientific evidence about the effects of drugs.  It’s about time someone stood up for the truth.

Knowing Nutt’s public disagreement with the government’s decision to re-classify cannabis as a Class B Drug and not to downgrade ecstasy, change could be in the air.

Stay tuned.