Legal highs ‘should be sold like alcohol’
'Legal high' drugs should be sold by pharmacists in the same way as alcohol in pubs so that doctors will know what teens have taken when they overdose, the UK government's former chief drugs adviser has said.
Prof David Nutt, who was sacked by ministers in 2009 after claiming that alcohol and tobacco were more dangerous than LSD, warned that users who buy party drugs online are risking their health because they do not know what is in them.
Britain should follow the model adopted in New Zealand and allow "legal highs" to be sold to over-18s over pharmacy counters, so that "if you then decide to overdose, at least you know what you're overdosing on", he said.
Legal highs are drugs which often mimic illegal substances but are designed to be chemically different so that they are not banned by existing laws.
Source: Irish Independent, 09/04/13
