BOOK SHELF Veteran anti-drug crusader's call to arms

'Street Drugs': The New Addiction Industry, by Elaine Walters OAM. Foreword by the Hon. Greg Hunt (Melbourne: Elaine Walters Foundation, 2023). Paperback: 416 pages. ISBN: 9780646877044. RRP: AUD$34.95

'Street Drugs': The New Addiction Industry is a compendium written for the layperson by Elaine Walters OAM, and reflects the author's lifetime crusade against the scourge which has afflicted Western society for several generations. The author refrains from using the term "illegal" in the book's title, as her opponents misguidedly target the current illegality of drugs as the main problem concerning drugs. They argue that legalisation would allow abuse of and addiction to these drugs to be treated openly as a health problem rather than as a criminal offence.

Former Coalition health minister, the Hon. Greg Hunt, provides a glowing foreword, while the author herself supplies an incisive introduction. The book contains 56 succinct essays, each of them providing accessible information on the drugs themselves and their adverse effects, the many issues involved in the debate, and an account of its history and the strategies of those who would do away with all restrictions. These essays are also cross-referenced, which is particularly useful.

A constant feature is Walters' ability to cut through and expose the deceptions and weasel words employed by her opponents. The remainder of the book consists of several appendices, a glossary of terms, endnotes for each chapter, and an extensive bibliography.

Essays on cocaine and on opium derivatives, such as heroin and morphine, are instructive and interesting.

For example, we are given a short history of the opium trade from India; Britain's disgraceful role in its two Opium Wars (1839–42 and 1856–60) against China; and this drug's penetration into British and American society as a popular medication, also known as laudanum.

Similarly, cocaine, derived from the cocoa leaves chewed as a stimulant by South American labourers, was promoted as a cure-all in Europe and the U.S. before its danger as an addictive substance led to its prohibition by the early 20th century. It was an ingredient in Coca Kola until 1903, when it was removed, leading to the name Coca Cola ever since, with only caffeine remaining as a stimulant.

Elaine Walters' book also contains brief essays on designer and synthetic drugs, where we learn how difficult they are to control or prohibit, the constituents only having to be altered to deflect any definition in regulations. From 2012 to 2015 the number of psychoactive drugs detected, according to a UN study, grew from 260 to 483. These and amphetamine-type drugs such as "crystal meth" or "ice" are capable of altering behaviour and creating harmful dependency. Given the soaring incidence of methamphetamine use in Australia today, one wishes more could be said about this drug in Walters' otherwise omnibus work.

It is of course cannabis and the indulgent way in which it has been treated by self-styled drug reformers and even governments which receive much of the attention in these essays. Touted as a "soft" or "recreational" drug, cannabis is anything but. Using it endangers health and well-being.

The author describes it as "amotivational", heavy use resulting in mediocrity in studies and work, and a general apathy. A controlled experiment in the Netherlands in 2015 found that students who could no longer buy marijuana legally improved their exam results substantially. As tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) — the chief mind-altering substance in marijuana — accumulates in the human body, it contributes to depression, suicide and violence, especially among young males. Readers of this newsletter will be familiar with the work of Miranda Devine, linking heavy marijuana use with mass shootings by young men in the U.S. (see Endeavour Forum Newsletter, No.181, April 2023).

The concept of the "gateway" role of marijuana in introducing users to what are known as "hard" drugs has been derided for years by pro-drug activists, although ample documented evidence supports it. Perhaps alcohol and tobacco are factors too; but once young people cross the threshold from legal to illegal drugs they encounter other users who may introduce them to other street drugs and increase their access to suppliers.

In spite of barefaced denial of this reality by pro-drug activists, numerous U.S. surveys show that most heroin and cocaine addicts started their drug dependency with marijuana. In 1975, when the use of marijuana was at its peak among 16- to 18-year-old students, a University of Michigan study covering all mainland states in America established this fact. Another study in 2003 of 311 same-sex twins, where only one twin smoked cannabis before the age of 17, showed that the user was five times more likely than the abstaining twin to move on to more potent drugs.

The author provides a diagram illustrating the steps to addiction, starting with experimentation, through occasional use, to habitual, then dependence and craving, leading on to other drugs.

This denial of the proven obvious is a hallmark of those who campaign for liberal drug laws and even legalisation of all street drugs. In one appendix to the book, Walters reproduces the strategic manual compiled by one noted pro-drug activist, who is quite transparent about the deceptions and especially the half-truths to be employed.

In another appendix, the late Dr Joe Santamaria OAM (1923–2019) — who, along with Elaine Walters OAM, co-founded the Drug Advisory Council of Australia (DACA) in August 1996 — explains how so-called "evidence-based" propositions can involve selective use of research papers which run counter to hundreds of others.

Such distortions can also be observed involving meta-analysis, where there are significant differences between the populations being studied. An example is given of how a single study's support for needle-exchange programs was negated by the results, in terms of subsequent addictions and resulting in high-risk sexual behaviour.

How often does the oft-repeated untruth become accepted fact? We are told constantly that the "war against drugs" has been lost and that different approaches involving so-called harm minimisation must take its place.

Between 1998 and 2007, when the Commonwealth government enforced a Tough on Drugs policy, the use of all illicit drugs in Australia decreased by 39% and opiate overdose deaths by 67%. The uptake since reflects the then change of government and its different focus on the problem.

Then take Portugal's decriminalisation of illicit drugs in 2001, frequently presented as a model for drug policy reform. There, drug use increased up until 2007, then decreased for a time, but only in line with other European nations, yet soared to 59% higher in 2017 than it had been in 2001.

In Australia the touted success of injecting rooms, drug education, clean-needle "exchange", methadone maintenance programs and even proposals for pill-testing at rave concerts is belied by the outcomes. Only interruptions to supply, as occurred during pandemic lockdowns, have slowed the increase in drug use. Similarly, the post-2001 downturn in heroin deaths in Sydney's red-light district in King's Cross, following the opening of a medically-supervised injection centre there, might more plausibly be attributed to a heroin drought, as similar trends were noted elsewhere in NSW.

In 1987 Elaine Walters attended an International Pharmacological Conference in Melbourne where numerous papers were delivered detailing the harmful effects on the health and lives of regular users of marijuana, only to find that days later the synopses of these findings were no longer available. Activists working in government departments and government-funded organisations have likewise shaped the narrative for decades and ensured that the only messages for politicians to deliver are those of acceptance of widespread drug use among the young, and the need for education to use drugs "safely".

This mantra of harm reduction then inspired drug education in schools and the provision of public "services" for drug-users. All of these measures implicitly normalise or sanction the use of illicit substances and undermine the work of police.

Walters shows us that even the claim that these services save addicts' lives is questionable and must be balanced against their encouraging drug use in the wider community. She points to coroners' reports showing overdose deaths still occurring in the vicinity of Melbourne's injecting rooms, reflecting the fact that those who "shoot up" there are allowed to leave the premises without any supervision.

Drug education material for schools avoids being judgmental to the extent that so-called "safe" use is prioritised over the dangers involved, and parental prerogatives disparaged. Methadone programs are critiqued as supplementing drug use in many cases (the evidence being a cocktail effect in overdose fatalities) and a better alternative is suggested. Pill-testing she dismisses as "expert" reassurance for the young to experiment with drugs.

The author's condemnation of the pro-drug activists and her concern for vulnerable young people are recurring themes in her book. Particularly disturbing material is found in a lengthy appendix consisting of a feature article from the UK Daily Telegraph in 2017.

It tells of thousands of British children — many of them runaways — roaming the country, groomed to act as drug couriers and suppliers. It includes case studies of "Lewis" and "Charlie" and what their families endured. The easy opportunities for exploiting children in this way are obvious, as they are easily tempted and intimidated, and fly under the radar of the police and the courts.

Elaine Walters' book contains so much of importance that it is impossible to do it justice here; but her evidence-backed arguments should be a wake-up call for those who unthinkingly go along with so-called harm minimisation and the soft-pedalling of drug use.

She has crammed her life's work into these pages, which are easily navigable for the reader, using the exhaustive table of contents provided. It will be a monument to this heroic lady and wants only a wider marketing and readership.

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