The recreational use of laughing gas has been banned in the UK from today. We are only the second country in the world to make the possession of nitrous oxide illegal – users of the now-class C drug will get up to two years in prison while dealers face jail time of up to 14 years. Though two government-led reviews concluded that the substance wasn’t dangerous enough to make it illegal, the growing evidence of insidious and long-lasting side effects suggests otherwise.
On the surface, laughing gas appears 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.
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