Afghan opium war solvable

Letters

Red Pepper

1b Waterlow Road

London N19 5NJ

The article on Afghanistan’s opium jihad (p 16, July issue) showed the futility of our Governemnt’s policy in Afghanistan. Our troops in Afghanistan are being killed and injured in a valiant but useless attempt to stop farmers there from growing opium. In effect, we are asking the farmers to starve, or at least to plunge themselves and their families into deep poverty, by refraining from planting opium. The chances of success are not high, and the leaders of our army there are giving signals that confirm this.

At the same time, the incidence of cancer in Africa is rising according to a recent report in the BMJ, and people there are dying of cancer without having access to morphine or heroin.

Two problems, one solution: instead of burning the Afghan opium crops, we could purchase it from the farmers, process it, and make it available in Africa.

A think tank, the Senlis Council, http://www.senliscouncil.net/modules/Opium_licensing are proposing poppy licensing. This will decriminalise poppy growing, and allow UN agencies to buy up the whole crop and turn it into medicine.

Any Red Pepper readers with access to paper and envelopes should ask the Ministers for Defence and Department for International Development why they will not consider this as an option.

Yours sincerely

Desert Rose Project

I have finally put up Project Desert Rose on my website. It has been preoccupying me for the last month: a vast, ambitious project that addresses the fact that all human civilisations, not just the current one, have destroyed the forests that surrounded them. In hot countries, the result is desertification. The responsibility of this generation is to reverse that trend by reafforesting it. It is ambitious, but feasible if only it could be given a small fraction of th emoney currently devoted to militarism.

Reforestation is rational. Militarism is irrational.

The question is, is mankind going to choose to be rational or irrational?

Surrey FMD: Vaccinate!!

I am dismayed that the Government has not yet begun a programme of emergency ring vaccination around the outbreak of Foot and mouth disease (FMD) in Surrey.

Defra's website states "The Government accepts that emergency vaccination should be considered as a disease control option from the start of any outbreak of FMD. There is a vaccination contingency plan in place, which would enable vaccination to begin 5 days after disease is confirmed if it is felt necessary".

Evidently the Defra vets prefer their old stampout methods at this stage. However, while they are killing herds that have an outbreak, the virus may be spreading to other vulnerable herds, through the air, through the water. Vaccination will reduce that vulnerability. The virus can multiply in unvaccinated herds. Its multiplication is significantly reduced in vaccinated herds.

Defra will argue that it is impossible to tell whether cattle in vaccinated herds are harbouring the virus. This is not true. Slightly more elaborate tests can establish this.

The Green Party devoutly hopes that Defra will bring this outbreak under control in the next few days.

If it spreads out of control, we should seek the dismissal of all involved in the decision not to vaccinate at this early stage.

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http://www.defra.gov.uk/animalh/diseases/fmd/about/qanda-0807.htm#1

Emergency vaccination will be considered if a veterinary risk assessment shows that measures additional to the basic slaughter policy were required to control the disease. The Vaccination Regulations 2006 place vaccination at the forefront of disease control policies and put in place control measures to enable vaccination to take place.

The EU Directive gives greater prominence to the potential use of emergency vaccination in the event of an outbreak as an adjunct to the basic slaughter policy. The Government accepts that emergency vaccination should be considered as a disease control option from the start of any outbreak of FMD. There is a vaccination contingency plan in place, which would enable vaccination to begin 5 days after disease is confirmed if it is felt necessary.