Legalizing the production of opium for medical use is neither viable or necessary

Proposals to legalise the production of opium in Afghanistan for medical use are unworkable and unnecessary, says the Minister of State for Africa, Asia, and the United Nations in an editorial in this week’s BMJ.

Writing in response to an article* in the BMJ that called for legal cultivation of poppies to combat the shortage of opiate medicines, Mark Malloch-Brown argues that a sustainable solution to the problem of illegal opium production requires attractive, economically viable legal livelihoods, security and good governance in Afghanistan, as well as a determined effort to reduce demand around the world.

Around 90% of the world’s opium comes from Afghanistan, most of it intended for the illegal market. Opium offers farmers a quick turnover and high returns, but production continues to drive instability and insurgency.

The Afghanistan government lacks the resources, institutional capacity, and control mechanisms to ensure that opium grown would be purchased legally, he says. In addition, those cultivating opium for legal medical usage would be in direct competition with illegal traffickers, which in turn could drive up the price of opium and encourage increased cultivation.

He suggests that the demand for legal opium is better met by established sources of production from countries like Turkey and Australia, where there are fewer problems with security and stability and where production costs are up to six times cheaper.

He also points out that a greater supply of medical opiates is not needed because the global demand for medical and scientific purposes is already fully met.

According to Malloch-Brown, the essential challenge is to create development initiatives and economic incentives that provide attractive legal alternatives for farmers. This can be done by improving the infrastructure and local government capacity, giving farmers improved access to markets, land, water, credit, food security, and employment, he argues.

The question of demand is the key, he says. The arguments regarding opium production are global and cannot be controlled with local strategies.

“Only by reducing demand [for heroin] on the streets everywhere will the producers and traffickers on the streets of Afghanistan be given the best reason to follow their alternative livelihoods”, he concludes.

Source: British Medical Journal

Related stories:

Opium and marijuana research go underground
The world’s leading expert on the opium poppy has joined forces with researchers working on another infamous drug-producing plant – cannabis – in hopes of finding new uses for the much-maligned sources of heroin and marijuana.
Probing Question: How does anesthesia work?
Many inventions of the 19th century -- telephones, airplanes, phonographs -- have helped to shape the modern world. However, it could be argued that the 1846 discovery of effective surgical anesthesia holds a place of honor among the century's advances.
High-risk behaviors could lead to HIV epidemic in Afghanistan
In a report that is among the first to describe the prevalence of HIV and Hepatitis B and C viruses in Afghanistan, a researcher from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine voiced concerns that increasing injection drug use and accompanying high-risk behavior could lead to an HIV epidemic in Afghanistan.
Addiction treatment gets tested
Heroin addicts in Scotland are undergoing a treatment involving low-level electrical impulses to determine if NeuroElectric Therapy actually works.
Incense is psychoactive: Scientists identify the biology behind the ceremony
Religious leaders have contended for millennia that burning incense is good for the soul. Now, biologists have learned that it is good for our brains too. In a new study appearing online in The FASEB Journal, an international team of scientists, including researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, describe how burning frankincense (resin from the Boswellia plant) activates poorly understood ion channels in the brain to alleviate anxiety or depression. This suggests that an entirely new class of depression and anxiety drugs might be right under our noses.
Despite warning, doctors stick with patch
Many doctors are overlooking Food and Drug Administration warnings about delivering the painkiller fentanyl through a skin patch.
Analysis of Chinese AIDS epidemic shows surprising patterns
The mountainous Chinese province of Yunnan is tucked into the country’s southwest corner, a scenic region that borders Burma, Laos and Vietnam. The province shares its rugged topography with the surrounding countries, but it shares a less favorable trait as well: a growing AIDS epidemic, driven by a thriving underground commercial sex trade and by heroin smuggled in from the opium-growing regions of its three neighbors, an area known as the “golden triangle.”
'Thirst for knowledge' may be opium craving
Neuroscientists have proposed a simple explanation for the pleasure of grasping a new concept: The brain is getting its fix. The "click" of comprehension triggers a biochemical cascade that rewards the brain with a shot of natural opium-like substances, said Irving Biederman of the University of Southern California. He presents his theory in an invited article in the latest issue of American Scientist.

News discussion:

Medicine & Health news