InTheNews.co.uk
Breaking News:
Your source for news

Health Story

 14 May 2008 01:15 BST

Govt backed over cannabis ad

Wednesday, 24 Oct 2007 08:31
Home Office advert warning of dangers of stronger cannabis backed by advertising watchdog

Health In Focus 

A Home Office advert warning teenagers of the growing strength of cannabis did not misinform the pubic, the UK advertising watchdog has said.

Three viewers and drug consultancy KFx had complained that a television advert in the government's Frank anti-drugs campaign was misleading.

The complainants said that the advert's message that stronger strains of cannabis than ever before were circulating was incorrect and questioned the use of the word strain altogether.

But the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) ruled that the statement "With stronger strains than ever before, the more you mess with cannabis, the more it could mess with your mind" was unlikely to mislead viewers.

In its successful defence the Home Office pointed to an in-house report and one from the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction that showed tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) levels – an indication of cannabis' potency – were increasing.

The department said that this was illustrated in the increased availability of 'sinsemilla' cannabis ('without seeds' in Spanish), otherwise known as skunk.

Although the Home Office accepted the complainants' criticism that sinsemilla was not a strain but a growing technique, it claimed that the statement was to be taken in the context of advice for young people.

It argued that "the use of language in Frank advertising was tailored specifically for an 11- to 18-year-old target audience" who would be "unaware of the scientific complexities in the definition of the word 'strain'".

In its decision not to uphold the complaints against the advert the ASA acknowledged that sinsemilla – grown using intensive indoor techniques – was not a strain.

But a spokesperson added: "Because the Home Office had shown that the potency of sinsemilla was higher than in previous years, we concluded that the ad was unlikely to mislead."End of story

More health news... 

Also In The News 

© 2008 Advertise | Privacy | Terms of Use