Rishi Sunak is right to be concerned about laughing gas

Laughing gas appears initially to be a fairly harmless drug. It doesn’t have a giveaway smell or any obvious adverse side effects – and it’s cheap. Post-pandemic there has been a huge rise in the number of teenagers and young adults taking it: today there are more than 600,000 regular users in the UK. After the Notting Hill Carnival, there were more than 3.5 tonnes of canisters left behind. Which is why, yesterday, Rishi Sunak has pledged to make laughing gas a class C drug by the end of the year in a move to ban the substance. The Prime Minister has come under some immediate criticism for choosing to focus efforts on a drug assumed to be benign, but the nitrous oxide’s debilitating long-term consequences have received much less attention.

Inhaling the substance gives users a fleeting high, its effects lasting only seconds. Then it’s straight back to normality. It’s popular because it’s such a quick hit.