Partial transcript of interview - Dr Bill Pring, Chair, AMA Public Health Committee - ABC Radio National, 'Australia Talks Back' Program

PRING: Yes, hello, Sandy.

McCUTCHEON: Now, why was there a need for the AMA to convene a summit on party drugs? What was the trigger?

PRING: Yes, well it's really an extension of our concerns about tobacco and alcohol. And the AMA is not forgetting those drugs for a start, and they're, of course, part of - as one of your callers said - recreational drugs that are used by lots of people. They're legal - legally available. But they cause an enormous amount of health, you know, ill health consequences. And so we're very concerned about those aspects, too, of party drugs. But we thought it was important to hold this conference because even though the figures from four years ago indicate perhaps around 5 percent of people using these party drugs - the ones that Caroline

PRING: But I think that we shouldn't be down on young people. Young people have shown a lot of responsibility with, say, having a specified driver to drive people home as far as alcohol is concerned. And I think if young people - and anybody using these drugs - are given proper information that's reliable, I think we can actually influence people's behaviour and avoid harm. And so whilst it's a little bit of a worry that people are so keen to put all sorts of things down their throats - and one has to look at the reasons why that might be - we also want to try and minimise the harm that might come to people by this type of use. And we think it might be increasing and so, as the AMA, we're wanting to do something about that.

The other interesting thing is that people tend to turn to their friends, or interestingly enough, their GPs when they want information about this. And so we think that we need to get better information to our general practitioners and, particularly in the AMA so that they can advise their patients properly. And not judgmentally, but just giving people the facts so that people can make some sensible decisions about how - if they're going to use drugs - how they may use them and cause less harm and have a proper dialogue with their GPs about their drug use.

Ends