Drug poster's shock tactics
New pictures reveal the devastating physical effects of drug addiction.
Photographs charting the decline of a young female addict over a series of years are being used for Scotland Yard's new hard-hitting anti-drugs campaign.
Officers hope the images will encourage people to inform on drug dealers.
Commander Stephen James of the Met's drugs directorate said: "Class A drugs destroy people's lives, the lives of their loved ones and the communities they live in.
"We appeal to Londoners to help target Class A drug dealers who supply corrosive material. If you have any information about drug dealers in your community you can call Crimestoppers anonymously."
The poster features a woman named Roseanne Holland, who became a drug addict at the age of
29. During the next nine years, the toll her addiction takes on her physical appearance is dramatic - by the end of the series of photographs she is almost unrecognisable. Shortly after the final picture was taken, she died of a suspected drug overdose.
The Met believes its new campaign strikes the right note but DrugScope chief executive Martin Barnes questioned whether the images would deter people from taking drugs.
"While emotive advertising campaigns designed to shock can be guaranteed plenty of attention, research that estimates the impact of such campaigns finds little to indicate that 'scare tactics' work as a means of dissuading people from taking drugs," he said.
"They can also serve to reinforce unhelpful polarised stereotypes of drugs and drug users that make it even more difficult for people to admit they have a problem and ask for help.
"Of far more practical benefit are targeted information and education campaigns."
The woman in the campaign is from the US and the photographs were taken by police as she was arrested for drug-related crimes. A Scotland Yard spokesman said the fact the woman was American did not matter because the harrowing effects of drugs transcended race, sex and nationality.
The images will be used on posters and beer mats and will be distributed in the capital's worst drug-hit boroughs, including Westminster, Brent, Camden, Croydon, Hackney, Lambeth, Lewisham and Tower Hamlets.
The new campaign comes as latest Met figures show 22,466 people were arrested for drugs offences in London during the last financial year.
