History of Legal and Illegal Drugs from 1965 to 1970 A.D.

About the history of legal and illegal drugs from 1965 to 1970 A.D. tobacco production and sales, LSD problems, sales and production of alcohol.

1966 Sen. Warren G. Magnuson makes public a program, sponsored by the Agriculture Dept. to subsidize "attempts to increase cigarette consumption abroad. . . . The Dept. is paying Warner Brothers $106,000 to insert scenes designed to stimulate cigarette smoking in a travelogue for distribution in 8 countries, and is also spending $210,000 to subsidize cigarette commercials in Japan, Thailand, and Austria." An Agriculture Dept. spokesman corroborates that "the 2 programs were prepared under a congressional authorization to expand overseas markets for U.S. farm commodities."

1966 C. W. Sandman, Jr., chairman of the New Jersey Narcotic Drug Study Commission, declares that LSD is "the greatest threat facing the country today . . . more dangerous than the Vietnam War."

1967 New York State's Narcotics Addiction Control Program goes into effect. It is estimated to cost $400 million in 3 years, and is hailed by Governor Rockefeller as "the start of an unending war. . . ." Under the new law, judges are empowered to commit addicts for compulsory treatment for up to 5 years.

1967 The tobacco industry in the U.S. spends an estimated $250 million on advertising smoking.

1968 The U.S. tobacco industry has gross sales of $8 billion. Americans smoke 544 billion cigarettes.

1968 Canadians buy almost 3 billion aspirin tablets and approximately 56 million standard doses of amphetamines. About 556 million standard doses of barbiturates are also produced or imported for consumption in Canada.

1968 Six to 7% of all prescriptions written under the British National Health Service are for barbiturates; it is estimated that about 500,000 Britons are regular users.

1968 Abram Hoffer, MD, and Humphry Osmond, MD, claim that "strong evidence supporting the use of LSD in a treatment program for alcoholism comes from all parts of the world. It is one of the brightest hopes for the victims of a long-neglected, little-understood disease."

1968 Brooklyn councilman Julius S. Moskowitz charges that the work of New York City's Addiction Services Agency, under its retiring commissioner, Dr. Efren Ramirez, was a "fraud," and that "not a single addict has been cured."

1969 The legal alcoholic beverage industry in the U.S. has a gross sale of $12 billion--more than is spent on education, medical care, and religion combined. Americans consume approximately 650 million gal. of distilled spirits, 100 million barrels and 6 billion cans of beer, 200 million gal. of wine, 100 million gal. of moonshine (illegal whiskey), and an unknown amount of homemade wine and beer.

1969 The world production of tobacco is 4.6 million metric tons, with the U.S., U.S.S.R., China, and Brazil as the leading producers; of wine, 275 million hectoliters, with Italy, France, and Spain as the leading producers; of beer, 595 million hectoliters, with the U.S., Germany, and the U.S.S.R. as the leading producers; of cigarettes, 2,500 billion, with the U.S., U.S.S.R., and Japan as the leading producers.

1969 U.S. production and value of some medicinal chemicals: barbiturates: 800,000 lbs., $2.5 million; aspirin (exclusive of salicylic acid): 37 million lbs., value "withheld to avoid disclosing figures for individual producers"; salicylic acid: 13 million lbs., $13 million; tranquilizers: 1.5 million lbs., $7 million.

1969 A report issued by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization discloses that, despite warnings about the deleterious effects of smoking on health, the consumption of cigarettes throughout the world is growing at the annual rate of 70 billion cigarettes. The U.S. exports tobacco leaf to 113 countries; tobacco accounts for 1/3 of all Greek exports, and 1/5 of the Turkish exports.

1969 The parents of 6,000 secondary-school pupils in Clifton, N.J., are sent letters by the Board of Education asking permission to conduct saliva tests on their children to determine whether or not they use marijuana.

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