Effectiveness of the government's ecstacy education programme

I am an undergraduate carrying out a final year research project into the effectiveness
of the government's ecstacy education programme. I believe that both historically and currently
the government's angle on ecstacy, fuelled by media hype and cases such as those of Leah
Betts, is not helping young people to understand the real dangers and hazards involved in the
ecstacy scene. My personal belief is that decriminalisation (and subsequent quality control)
combined with decent drug education is the only way to significantly reduce the number of drug
related deaths, not to mention the amount of drug related property crime. Of course, this
approach creates a whole new set of problems, and in reality is highly unlikely.

As an occasional user of ecstacy several years ago, I felt the "don't do it, you'll die" approach did more harm than good, as the hundreds of thousands (or more?) people who took ecstacy then, and all their friends, knew this to be misinformation, and this possibly only served to heighten the general feeling of mistrust felt towards the government and officialdom in general.

William Swain <fbuq6@central.susx.ac.uk>