UK - Mephedrone more popular since being banned – survey

[edgarshade]

The Observer

Jamie Doward
The Observer, Sunday 11 March 2012

With reader comments

Four in 10 club-goers questioned say mephedrone is their drug of choice

Moves to criminalise the new wave of synthetic drugs, known as legal highs, appear to have backfired after it emerged that mephedrone is now more popular among clubbers than when it was not banned.

Confirmation comes in a survey of London club-goers carried out by researchers at Lancaster University and Guy's and St Thomas' NHS foundation trust. Published on Monday in the Journal of Substance Use, it assesses the impact of the classification of mephedrone as a class B drug.

The survey builds on earlier work, conducted one evening in July 2010, three months after the drug was made illegal, which found the popularity of mephedrone had surpassed that of all other drugs, with 27% of people questioned in two gay-friendly south London dance clubs reporting that they had or were going to take it that night.

More...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/mar/11/mephedrone-more-popular-after-ban?newsfeed=true

 

[poledriver]

Moves to criminalise the new wave of synthetic drugs, known as legal highs, appear to have backfired after it emerged that mephedrone is now more popular among clubbers than when it was not banned.

haha bad luck law makers. Time to rethink your strategies maybe?

 

[LogicSoDeveloped]

I think this makes sense in that when new compounds are created or produced to go around existing laws, some are going to take off like Mephedrone has, especially when people have access to tons of high quality product that is way cheaper than its illicit counterparts. Even when banned, the demand is still there.

 

[23536]

There's no way that a majority of people are picking mephedrone over, say, MDMA.

DRUG OF CHOICE is not the same thing as DRUG MOST AVAILABLE.

 

[qwe]

haha bad luck law makers. Time to rethink your strategies maybe?

it's win-win for the powers that be. they don't want people to stop using, they want these drugs to go through illicit channels.

well, not win-win on the propaganda front when journalists do their job... nice article.

 

[raver2008]

lol its amazing to me that people are surprised to hear this. Its time that the majority gets a fucking clue . Laws do not reduce usage.

 

[pete+carl]

There's no way that a majority of people are picking mephedrone over, say, MDMA.

DRUG OF CHOICE is not the same thing as DRUG MOST AVAILABLE.

i prefer mephedrone to mdma
comedowns less severe and i like the extra energy

 

[LuGoJ]

Prohibition works so well

 

[Newbierock]

^ You prefer meph over mdma? really?

Ever had actual MDMA?

 

[Na'vi]

Meph for me feels like a dirty pill and the come down is much worse than MD (last time it lasted for five days, comparable with a one or two day MD come down). Given a choice though I'd rather do meph again over MD, I abused MD too much back in the day and now just looking at it makes me feel a bit queasy.