Via the Herald (ht Education Directions):
The Illicit Drug Monitoring System report found the price – commonly regarded as the best measure of police success against the drug – had increased each year.
Interesting. So they use ever rising prices as a measure of ever rising success. This is weird on two grounds:
- We are using regulation, not the market – yet using prices as an indicator seems to point out that we could use a market mechanism here.
- If we accept the market mechanism, then even in the face of externalities there is an appropriate “price” – if we go past that I wouldn’t call that a “success”
Also, they seem to have trouble attributing appropriate causation:
Dr Wilkins said dealers around the world had reacted (to restrictions) by filling the (Ectasy) pills with other substances, including methamphetamine, which could create a highly dangerous cocktail of drugs.
…
A revival in LSD use, possibly as Ecstasy users look for a stronger drug.
So they attribute the rise in LSD use to “addicts” wanting a stronger fix – even though they have already admitted that the consumers value of Ecstasy has been lowered by tightening restrictions overseas, which have reduced quality and increase the potential health impact. If anything I would say that the “obvious” reason for the substitution from Ecstasy to LSD would be the result of these tighter restrictions …