Not All Drugs Are Created Equal

New York Times by Robert Gable
Twenty years ago, when my son was a teenager, his favorite recreational drug was ecstasy, or MDMA. He claimed that ecstasy was “as safe as alcohol,” and that there was nothing to worry about. Of course, I did worry. My worry eventually led to a decade-long research project that compared the relative risk of 20 different recreational substances. Here’s the way scientists usually make comparisons of the risk (acute lethality) of various drugs: First, determine the “effective” dose of the drug. In the case of alcohol, for example, two 12-ounce beers or two 1.5-ounce shots of 80-proof vodka will give a normally healthy teenager a substantial buzz. The beer or the vodka each contain about 33 grams of ethyl alcohol.

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