W.Z. Has Criteria For Drug Disaster

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31923, 26 February 1969, Page 1

W.Z. Has Criteria For Drug Disaster

New Zealand now had all criteria for an American-type disaster in attempts to control drug dependence and addiction, said Dr J. R. E. Dobson, head of the North Canterbury Hospital Board’s department of psychiatric medicine, yesterday.

Dr Dobson, speaking at the conference of the Royal Society for the Promotion of Health, said he was gloomy about the New Zealand scene.

The Narcotics Act provided identical penalties for opiates and cannabis (marijuana),

and although official policy statements claimed medical treatment of illicit drug users had priority, official action belied this.

He gave examples from his own experience. One young person was sent to gaol for his first drug offence and another was sentenced to detention centre and probation after his first offence.

“Until I saw him, no attempt whatever had been made to understand why he was injecting himself intrevenously with opiates,” said Dr Dobson. “He is now identified with the drug-using subculture and manifests the changes in attitude and! values typical of addiction as described by sociologists.” He said the stern, punitive, repressive approach in the United States was an admitted failure, yet New Zealand had not learned from United States experience. This was exemplified by an Auckland Magistrate, Mr M. C. Astley, who promised deterrent sentences o." imprisonment for drug users who were not addicts.

“Apart from the difficulty in agreeing who is or who is not an addict, the hazard of sentencing young first offenders to imprisonment is well recognised and accepted by anyone who takes an intelligent interest in penal treatment,” said Dr Dobson.

“Mr Astley’s punitive attitude to patients with psychological tendency is revealed; by his statement that addicts would continue to be sent to a mental hospital where the torture of drug withdrawal would be a punishment in itself. POLICE ATTITUDE “Furthermore, in contradiction to declared policy, local police officers express hostility and a derogatory attitude w'hen discussing medical treatment of drug dependence—privately and when lecturing.” He quoted Detective Superintendent F. A. Gordon, of Christchurch, who. when advising parents to report suspicions regarding their children to the police, agreed that parents “could consult their own family doctor, but the doctor could do little but advise on

the dangers of experimenting! with drugs.” Dr Dobson said he had inquired directly from the! World Health Organisation headquarters in Geneva about statements attributed to it by Mr Gordon. Mr Gordon had been reported as saying last month that he firmly disagreed with the British Wootton Committee which said that the dangers of cannabis had been exaggerated and legal penalties for using it were too severe. He said the W.H.O. and the Social and Economic Council of the United Nations had both strongly condemned can-j nabis and advocated strong' legislation against it. “Unfortunately, neither statement is correct,” said Dr Dobson. Dr Dobson said he considered the possible benefits of! |an educational programme! had been nullified because the credibility of authority had been destroyed by state-) ments such as those of Mr! Gordon. U.K. “SCANDAL” He said the failure to provide even minimal provisions! for care of mentally ill or severely disturbed adolescents in England had become a na-| tional scandal, and in NewZealand he knew of only a handful of beds in the Otago Medical School’s psychologi-c-1 medicine department which were provided for seriously ill adolescents. Dr Dobson said there must be full acceptance that young | people who used drugs dangerously were without exception disabled by psychological) | disorder and unlikely to be I helped significantly until) :some under-standing of the | nature of their disorder was j achieved. He said the police would be | I better employed doing someI thing other than defending by I I dubious arguments and inaccurate . statements laws which had been called in question. “Education programmes should be conducted by professional educators,” he said. “Statements should be cautious, factual and present both sides of contentious issues.

“It is possible that some episodes of hazardous selfadministration o' dangerous drugs in unknown doses may be a late 1960 s version of ‘chicken.’ If so. stern warnings of dangers of drug-tak-ing are likely to provoke, not prevent.”