Hallelujah! Christian who says family life can beat addiction is new Government drugs adviser



Tough stance: Hans-Christian Raabe, newly appointed to the ACMD, believes that drug prevention lies in education

For years, the Government’s drugs advisers have been demanding a soft approach to cannabis and other banned substances.

But, finally, that appears likely to change following the appointment of a Christian GP who takes a hard line against smoking the drug and says strong families can help to defeat alcohol and other addictions.

Dr Hans-Christian Raabe, a member of an international Christian movement who has been appointed to sit on the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, says children should simply be taught to say no. His appointment to the ACMD signals a shake-up in thinking for the panel, which has clashed repeatedly with ministers in recent years.

Many of its members prefer to focus on reducing the harm caused by drugs – instead of stopping them from being used in the first place.

Under Labour, the panel twice said cannabis should be a Class C rather than Class-B drug, and even suggested the downgrading of dance-drug ecstasy from A to B.

Other advice has concentrated on reducing the harm to users by giving them the materials needed to take drugs more safely, such as free aluminium foil for smoking heroin.

But Dr Raabe, who will represent GPs on the committee, has a far stricter track record, and prefers to focus on prevention.

Briefing documents for MPs produced by Dr Raabe state: ‘Marriage is associated with greater happiness, less depression, less alcohol abuse and less smoking.’

Shake up: Dr Raabe has been appointed to the committee as his views on cannabis are more trenchant (stock picture)

Difference in opinion: Professor David Nutt, the former ACMD chairman, said that smoking cannabis creates only a 'relatively small risk' of psychotic illness

He holds views strongly at odds with former ACMD chairman Professor David Nutt, who believes that prohibition has failed and wants a new approach to classification based on the harm that each drug poses.

Dr Raabe said: ‘Harm reduction has its place, but I’m concerned that it’s the only policy being advocated.

‘In schools, for example, where the majority of children don’t take drugs, we still need a prevention approach.’

In an article in the British Medical Journal online, he attacked a ‘flawed report’ by the International Centre for Science in Drug Policy that suggested increasing cannabis consumption showed prohibition was failing.

He wrote: ‘The only way of stopping people from dying from drug-related deaths is to prevent drug use in the first place!’ He also co-signed a letter in 2004, warning against the government’s decision to reclassify cannabis from class B to class C.

It said: ‘A person who uses cannabis by age 15 has more than a four-fold increased risk of developing schizophrenia symptoms over the next 11 years compared with a person starting to use cannabis by 18.’ Professor Nutt, who now runs his own drugs panel, has said that smoking cannabis creates only a ‘relatively small risk’ of psychotic illness.

This weekend, he complained that the ‘appointment of Dr Raabe confirms in my mind that the ACMD cannot be considered to be a body that has science at the heart of its decision-making’.

Professor Nutt was sacked by the then home secretary in October 2009 for saying cannabis was less harmful than alcohol and nicotine.

Dr Raabe was appointed last week to the post, which will last for three years and is unpaid.

He has rejected concerns that his faith would influence his advice, saying that ‘society was in danger of believing that if you are a Christian you are not fit for public office or you are biased or a bigot’.