Editorial gives misleading impression

doi:10.1136/bmj.39577.628148.BE

BMJ 2008;336:1088 (17 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.39577.628148.BE

Letters

Opium production in Afghanistan

Editorial gives misleading impression

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Malloch-Brown surely gives a misleading impression when he writesthat global demand for opiates for medical purposes is fullysatisfied.¹ The International Narcotics Control Board has reportedthat there is little or no reported medical use of any opioid(not just heroin/diamorphine) in some two thirds of the world’scountries. People there have the same need for the relief ofpain and suffering, especially in palliative care and becauseof the ravages of AIDS epidemics, but they have no access todoctors or other prescribers or nobody is willing to prescribeor is not allowed to do so. This often results from the indiscriminatedemonisation/prohibition in anti-drugs campaigns.

As it happens, we in the United Kingdom are now in the fourthyear of a major diamorphine injection shortage such that streetheroin—said to be increasingly pure because of abundantsupply—is much cheaper than diamorphine ampoules, theonly form licensed for . . . [Full text of this article]

Don C Aston, retired

¹ Solihull B90 2BG

don.aston@btinternet.com