Vatican hits out at drugs — and fags and booze too

BY BRUCE JOHNSTON IN ROME
THE VATICAN has unveiled a campaign to resist moves to legalise drugs, a list of which it says should include tobacco and alcohol, as well as cannabis, cocaine and heroin.
In a new document, the Pontifical Council for the Family argues that there could be no happy distinction of "hard" and "soft" drugs.
All were harmful substances that could cause addiction, whose definition "should be reasonably broadened to include many substances ...not considered drugs, including tobacco and alcohol".The document, which represents the first formal statement by a Pope on smoking, also went much further than John Paul II's last official statement on drinking, in 1992.
In addition, it mentioned anti-depressants, sedatives, stimulants and drugs that ease anxiety.
The statement appeared to clash with the 1992 statement, in which the Pope said there was a "clear difference" between using drugs (something that was "always illicit") and taking alcohol (which when done to excess was merely "to be condemned").