Doctors demand curbs on ‘new Valium’ drugs

DOCTORS have called for a crackdown on popular painkillers dubbed ‘the new Valium’ over fears that they are highly addictive.

More than a million Britons have been prescribed pregabalin and gabapentin to treat chronic pain and anxiety. The drugs are also licensed to treat epilepsy.

Prescriptions for both drugs have more than doubled since they were licensed in 2011. They have been linked to scores of deaths and cases of addiction.

Now the British Medical Association says it wants to see stricter controls. In a memo leaked to The Mail on Sunday, the BMA warns that the drugs are ‘associated with problems of abuse and addiction’, adding they ‘can, when misused, produce a similar euphoric high to opiates’.

It is backing a Home Office plan to treat them the same way as other addictive drugs such as tramadol by making them class C substances. Possession without a prescription would be illegal and could lead to prison.