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  • "They can sack me. But they cannot silence me."

    The Tough Case of Professor Nutt

    David Nutt worked as a scientific advisor for the British government. His contract was discontinued in 2009 because of his views on drugs. He delivered a speech on the issue at the British Science festival.

    I sure did not enjoy getting sacked. But I would not take back anything I said. I was telling my view as a scientist – and I am sure going to continue doing so, professor David Nutt says at the British science festival.

    The position of scientific advisor is often brought up in discussions on how politics and science could work together, and many people expect advisors to be among the suggestions that the emeritus-chancellor, Kari Raivio, is about to present in his report later this fall.

    But a position of a scientific advisor can also be tricky. And of this David Nutt gives us a perfect example. Nutt is a psychiatrist and neuropsychopharmacologist and has worked as a drug policy advisor for the British Department of Health, Ministry of Defence and the Home Office.

    In January 2009, his comments started to tread on the toes of the politicians. First he compared taking ecstasy to riding on a horse, noting that horses kill far more people annually than the notorious drug. This made the home secretary to publicly criticise her own advisor.

    But this did not stop Nutt. In October, he allowed a lecture of his to be published in a pamphlet against the Government’s decision to classify cannabis as a more dangerous drug than it had been considered before. It was now classified as class B drug, thereby grading it up from the earlier C status. In his lecture, Nutt argued that according to the damage caused to the society, alcohol and tobacco should be classified as class B drugs, but cannabis should remain in the C-category.

    This was too much for the home secretary, and Nutt was publicly dismissed from his position.

    This has not made the tabloid-labelled ”dangerous professor” to withdraw his claims.

    — Everything I have said was based on facts. What is the point of being a scientific advisor, if you cannot or will not voice your scientific views? Nutt asked while giving a speech at the British Science Festival in September 2014.

    — I have also got pretty strong support, he noted, while showing a picture of the US president, Barack Obama, giving his speech on the change in the US drug policy on cannabis. While Nutt pointed out that Obama had no alternative — otherwise the Federal drug officials would have had to start dealing with States that had legalized cannabis — he nonetheless added a text to the picture: Obama agrees with Nutt.

    Nutt also believed that in reality the top UK politicians did also agree with him — but did not have the courage to do so in public.

    — They have a lot at stake. Drugs are an easy target for a moral attack by the tabloids, so the politicians are afraid to touch on the matter, he pointed out. But politicians are not stupid.

    — There just does not seem to be that many votes for doing the right thing. Remember, that the people suffering from our drug policies are often young and belong to the minorities. They get arrested, not the Eton students.

    And getting arrested carries the risk of getting a criminal record, which Nutt argued to be a far worse thing for a young person than the occasional use of cannabis.

    He also pointed a finger at the alcohol industry, which is keen not to repeat the mistakes the tobacco industry made.

    — They do not say alcohol is not dangerous, they just say you have to enjoy it right. They do not say anything they cannot get away with, and so they make it easy for politicians to look the other way.

    Nutt himself is not looking the other way. As a Professor at The Imperial College, London, Nutt seeks to get his voice heard. He is also the chair of the Independent Scientific Committee on Drugs, and from this position he aims to convey balanced and realistic information on drugs, including the view that alcohol is more dangerous than cannabis.

    — They can sack me. But they cannot silence me, Nutt told the crowd.

    text Juha Merimaa
    photo Layton Thompson / Imperial College London

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