I've taken cannabis, says chief medical officer: Britain's top doctor admits experimenting at university

Dame Sally Davies admitted dabbling with drug during 1970s



She said she baked it in cookies while studying at university



But she stopped after suffering hallucinations and has not tried it since



In an interview England's top doctor also said addiction should be treated as a public health issue and not a criminal issue

England's most senior doctor yesterday admitted she had taken cannabis.

Professor Sally Davies also appeared to question the policy of treating drug abuse as a criminal offence.

Dame Sally, the chief medical officer, said she had experimented with cannabis three or four times at university but stopped after suffering hallucinations.

Professor Dame Sally Davies said all babies and young children should be given free vitamins on the NHS

She has previously claimed that criminalising drugs deterred addicts from seeking medical help.

Dame Sally has also said she would be ‘ready with quite a lot of advice’ if ministers decided to decriminalise some drugs.



Mental health charities have warned that any move to liberalise Britain’s drugs laws could increase the use of cannabis, which has been widely linked to psychological problems.

Dame Sally, 63, recently named as the sixth most powerful woman in Britain, revealed she had tried cannabis baked into cookies while studying medicine at Manchester University in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The Government’s most senior medical adviser said: ‘I never smoked, so I couldn’t smoke joints, but I did have some cookies until on the third or fourth occasion I had hallucinations and I have never touched it since.

‘I think I understood through that what my father said to me when I told him I was going to try it. He said drugs de-civilise you, you stop being a civilised person.’



Dame Sally said she tried cannabis baked into cookies while she was studying at university Dame Sally, who was appointed as England’s chief medical officer in 2010, has always stopped short of supporting the decriminalisation of any illegal drugs. But she has repeatedly questioned whether the Government’s policy on drug use should be driven by the Home Office, with its inevitable focus on law and order, or by the Department of Health.

Interviewed on BBC Radio 3’s Private Passions yesterday, she said: ‘Of course it’s a medical problem, addiction is a medical problem and it becomes a public health problem and then our society is choosing to treat that as a criminal justice issue.’

Giving evidence to MPs on the science and technology select committee in January, she said: ‘I think we have a health problem and we would do well as a nation to look at it as a health problem.

‘I think there’s quite a lot of evidence from other countries, and science, about how you could go about that.’

Her comments drew criticism from anti-drugs campaigners. Peter Stoker, of the National Drug Prevention Alliance, said: ‘When people say they want it treated as a health matter what they really mean is they want it decriminalised.

‘There are health implications to using cannabis but there are also social and legal problems.’

Dame Sally said addiction to drugs should be treated as a medical issue (file picture)

Mary Brett, of charity Cannabis Skunk Sense, said: ‘Lots of people try it at university but it would have been helpful if she could have said that cannabis now is much stronger and more dangerous than when she tried it.

‘She is the chief medical officer, she ought to have included some kind of warning to children not to try it.’

Dame Sally is England's first female chief medical officer

Around two million people in Britain use cannabis, according to the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and half of all 16 to 29-year-olds have tried it at least once. But recent research has suggested the drug can be linked to psychotic illnesses.

The Home Office has resisted numerous calls for the radical liberalisation of Britain’s drug laws, including from its own advisers.

Professor David Nutt was sacked as chairman of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs after he criticised the decision to upgrade cannabis to a Class B drug in 2009.

Dame Sally admitted her high-profile role, which has a salary of more than £200,000, could be difficult when her personal beliefs did not match policy.

But in a wide-ranging interview, she also said she had deliberately cut down on drinking wine since her appointment because of official guidelines.

She said: ‘I have never hidden the fact I enjoy a glass of wine but I try not to be photographed now with one, and I do drink less because I have read the evidence and I am persuaded of it .’

Dame Sally, who lives with her third husband and their two daughters in Islington, North London, was named as the sixth most powerful woman in Britain by BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour in February.