3.0. D.
IREC
C.0.
2956/
Red 1994
ROYAL COMMISSION ON OPIUM.
45
Questions regarding opium consumption and opium revenue in the Colonies and Dependencies of Singapore, Penang and Hongkong.
(1) Is opium commonly consumed by people of Chinese, Malay, or other Asiatic race in your Colony?
(2) What proportion—should you conjecture—of the adult males of each race are consumers? Do women consume opium to any extent? Do children?
(3) What have you observed to be the effects of opium moral, physical and social, on its consumers? Is the effect the same on consumers of each race, or can you draw distinctions between the effects on consumers of different races?
(4) Do consumers chiefly smoke, or do they eat opium? or do they drink a decoction of opium? If opium is taken in two or all of these forms, can you distinguish between the effects of each?
(5) Do the great majority of opium consumers become slaves to the drug and eventually become "opium sots," or do you find the majority, or a considerable proportion, of consumers to be moderate consumers?
(6) Is it correct to say that there cannot be such a thing as moderation in the consumption of Opium? Do you know any or many cases of consumers who have taken their opium for years without harm to themselves? If so, please give description of one or two such cases in detail.
(7) Do a majority of the labourers, or of the merchants, or of the artizans, belonging to any Asiatic race with which you are conversant, consume opium? If so, what is generally the effect of the opium habit on their efficiency in their calling? If possible give details and examples in reply to this question.
(8) How does the use or abuse of opium among any Asiatic races with which you are conversant compare with the use or abuse of alcohol among such races, in regard to the effect on consumers?
(9) Is the habit of consuming opium condemned as degrading, or injurious, by the general opinion of the Chinese, Malay or other Asiatic race? How would such races regard the opium habit as compared with the alcohol habit?
(10) Can and do opium consumers break themselves of the opium habit?
(11) If the supply of Indian opium were to be cut off, what would be the effect on opium and on the Asiatic population of your neighbourhood? Would they supply themselves with opium from elsewhere? or would they take to alcohol or to some narcotic other than opium? or would they abstain altogether?
TO.