Pubdate: Fri, 15 Jun 2012
Source: Victoria Times-Colonist (CN BC)
Copyright: 2012 Times Colonist
Contact: http://www2.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/letters.html
Website: http://www.timescolonist.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/481
Author: Tamsyn Burgmann
Page: A2

PURE ECSTASY CAN BE 'SAFE,' SAYS B.C. HEALTH OFFICER

VANCOUVER - B.C.'s top health official says taking pure ecstasy can be
"safe" when consumed responsibly by adults, despite warnings by police
in Alberta and British Columbia about the dangers of the street drug
after a rash of deaths.

Dr. Perry Kendall said the risks of MDMA - the pure substance
originally synonymous with ecstasy - are overblown, and that its
lethal dangers only arise when the man-made chemical is polluted by
money-hungry gangs who cook it up. That's why the chief provincial
health officer is suggesting the risks of black market MDMA might be
mitigated, for example if it were legalized and potentially sold
through licensed, government run stores where the product is strictly
regulated from assembly line to check-out.

Kendall took issue with a story by The Canadian Press on Thursday that
characterized him as advocating legalization, saying that isn't his
position. "I am quite a strong critic of prohibition because I don't
think it keeps drugs out of the hands of vulnerable people and I don't
think it does much to reduce harmful use and I think it has other
harmful effects like putting billions of dollars into the hands of
criminal enterprises," Kendall said in an interview.

However, he said he is not advocating legalization as the solution,
but rather, there should be a discussion about ways of doing things
other than the current losing war on drugs.

"There's perhaps a subtle distinction here," he said at a news
conference to clarify his views.

"I do think that we should be looking at that approach for current
illicit psychoactive drugs because I think we can come up with a
better mechanism of control," Kendall said.

"What I did not say was that I was advocating for MDMA to be legalized
at the present time and distributed through government stores. I said
if it were to be legalized, then it should be strictly regulated and
one way of doing that would be through strictly controlled government
exits. There's a difference."
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