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Sex workers

Nasty little bit of political correctness in the Guardian, referring to the victims of the serial killer in Ipswich. The girls needed the money to feed their heroin habit. And even leaving aside the risk of getting into the hands of complete nutters, being a prostitute is a dangerous activity.

Some of the trouble is our attitude to drugs. Nicotine is OK even though it affects innocent bystanders, at least we only have to wait till next year before it will be possible to go into pubs and restaurants without getting smoked out. Why they don't promote chewing tobacco in the country is a mystery, at least it does not annoy other people or cause a fire hazard.

Alcohol is the big one but the government encourages it - it is a nice earner for the Chancellor. The police can hardly cope here in Brighton at the weekends and all night long there are noisy people walking through what used to be a quiet area so you have to sleep at the back or with the windows closed. Alcohol does far more harm in aggregate than the hard drugs.

Heroin is the problem it is partly because it is illegal and it therefore gives rise to a lot of crime as the addicts will stop at nothing to get the money to pay for their next fix. One answer might be for the NHS to have places where people could go and inject themselves with the stuff, or even detain them as in-patients in mental hospitals. Which would also stop users from become pushers and spreading the habit. And the reduced crime would help to empty the prisons.

As for cocaine, the trouble here is that all sorts of "respectable" people are taking it. Maybe the NHS should stop paying for treatment for the problems it causes, and perhaps, too, crimes committed under the influence of drugs should be regarded as "aggravated" offences and punished more severely.

Certainly it needs a rethink, as the present system is not working. One question that is rarely asked is why people want to take this stuff at all.
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