Under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, the Possession and Supply of Class a, B and C Drugs Are Criminal Offences. Is That Legitimate? Should We Enact a “Misuse of Tobacco and Alcohol Act”? or Should the Possession and

The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 is intended to prevent the non-medical and recreational use of controlled drugs, which the Home Secretary deems illegal. The Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 categorises drugs in classifications ranging from A to C in accordance to their perceived harm. The Act makes not only possession of these control drugs illegal but also their production and especially their supply, unless there is a expressed circumstance in which the drug is allowed, found in Misuse of Drugs Regulations 2001 . However it can be argued that alcohol and cigarettes can be just as harmful, if not more due to the frequency of their use, than other substances currently prohibited by the Misuse of Drugs Act, and that these too for public safety should be included in the prohibiting act. It is evident that the Government is aware of the dangers of these substances with the current legislative measures taken, such as The Health Act 2006 which prohibited smoking in most enclosed and public places throughout the United Kingdom and The Licensing Act 2003 which places restrictions on where and how much alcohol can be sold, however no prohibitions, excluding age, have been placed on the possession of these substances. By not including tobacco and alcohol into the classification of a prohibited control drug, it may be argued that this is a failure to convey the dangers of these substances and ultimately is a failure of our Government and society to protect people from these evident dangers.

In the United Kingdom the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971 has faced a lot a criticism over what the law covers, in particular which substances are classified as prohibited drugs. The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee reprimanded that “the present system of drug classification is based on historical assumptions, not scientific assessment.” This has then be extended more recently by Nutt, King, Sausbury and Blakemore in the medical article "Development of a rational scale to assess the...