GLOBAL ISSUE, AN INTERNATIONAL PROBLEM.

At the turn of the century, with the development of the intercontinental communications, it became apparent to the nations of the world that the control of substances dangerous to man's healthy and to society-mainly opium at the time- had to be controlled on global basis. Representatives of sovereign nations held conferences to formulate regulations for the international; control opium and other dangerous drugs.

The first such gathering was held in Shanghai in 1904 at the instigation of President Theodore Roosvelt. This preliminary meeting set the stage for the First Opium Conference at The Hague in 1912. By the time of the Second Opium Conference, held in Geneva in 1924, some scientist had agree that the time for cannabis control was at hand. While opium was still the major consideration, Egypt's delegate, Dr. El Guindy, said, that there was another product, which is at least as harmful as opium. He referred to marijuana. In answer to questions from other delegates, Dr. El Guindy claimed that although the Egyptian government had banned the growing of cannabis, large amounts were still smuggled in from neighbouring countries. Because of pressure of the Egyptian and also Turkish delegates, who would not sign a ban on opium unless cannabis was also included, after some debate all the delegates voted in favor of controlling "Indian Hemp" as defined by the "dried flowering or fruiting tops of the pistillate plant Cannabis Sativa from which the resin has not been extracted, under whatever name they may be designated in commerce". Thus, cannabis was put on the forbidden list, not because of medical reason, but for social ones. After the second World War, the United Nations inherited the duty of enforcing the highly complex international agreements on control of dangerous drugs, including the above cannabis control resolution. When the World Health Organisation came into being in 1848, this responsibility was shifted to them in the form of an expert Committee on Drug Dependence that served as an advisory group to the United Nations Commission on Narcotics. The committee, made up of physicians and scientists, reviewed the cannabis situation and quickly came to the conclusion "that use of the drug was dangerous from every point of view, whether physical, mental or social". The ultimate result of this review was the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drug in which 500 delegates from seventy-four nations, including some of the best toxicologist and pharmacologists in the world, recommended that cannabis, in all its forms, be limited exclusively to medical and scientific purposes.