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century. There is another aspect to this regarding kava, and that is the cultural disdain for what is seen as an organic as opposed to a synthetic product. Rates (2001) argues that it was 'the Industrial Revolution [starting 200 years ago] and the development of organic chemis- try [that] resulted in a preference for synthetic products' (603). He argues the agenda behind this'prefenmce' is 'the economic power of the pharmaceutical compa- nies ... [and] industrialised western societies, in which drugs from natural resources were considered either an option for poorly educated or low income people or simply as religious superstition of no pharmaco- logical value' (603). The assumption in Rates' study is that unless a sub- stance is produced in a lab, it is/was likely to be inferior or even dangerous, regardless of a lengthy history of safe traditional use. This opinion was echoed in the following comment recently published in Current .Neuropharmacology: '[his review [which included kava) demonstrates that even if psychoactive plants have been known and used from ancient times, there is still limited informa- tion regarding subjective and neuro -pharmacological effects and consequent eventual toxicity when plants are used alone or in combination with `classical" drugs of abuse. For this reason, i gnificam safety u cents should be raised on recreational use of these sub stances. (Graziano a al., 2012 757) This is reported despite the 2016 WHO's kava risk assessment which notes a lengthy history of kava use and an 'acceptably low level of health risk' (Abbott, 2016: 26). Coomber and South (2004) add that regardless of the value that a number of traditional medications may have to medical advancement, contemporary Western discourse continues to link these traditional substances with 'backwardness or underdevelopment' (18). Escobar (1988) sees that the oppositional binaries of 'us and them', 'primitive/modern', 'back- ward versus developed' becomes a'fictitious construct, an omnipresent... discourse_. of power propagated by the Furocentric view that positions anything deemed to counter modernity and economic develop- ment as 'primitive' (429) Therefore, cultural practices and traditional medicines like kava in its natural form become threats that must be regulated or eliminated - Kovaleva (2016) discusses the perceived 'threat' that alternative safer substances such as kava pose to the alcohol industry, an industry that has worked hard to 'normalise alcohol in contrast to alternative suh- stances 'In spite of the statistics that exemplify the financial and social ramifications of alcohol consump- tion. alcohol remains readily accessible and available' comments Hardwick (2019), who adds that drinking is frequently considered ante of passage... and excessive consumption often normalised' by sectors of socioty- Mercovaq Petticrew of al. (2019) argue the alcohol industry actively uses deception and deliberately 'mis- represents scientific evidence' related to the health implications of alcohol use in a similar manner to the tobacco industry (300). _- _ While unconscious Eurocentrism and the power of the alcohol and tobacco industry is argued as contributing to the negative fram- ing of 'natural' drugs such as kava as a threat and vicariously unsafe, it would be naive to assume that kava is completely harmless. No drug is harm -free and neither is this article suggesting kava provides the ultimate, idyllic alternative to all substances. As dis- cussed earlier, the recent Australian MCDA drug - ranking exercise acknowledged that kava has some level of harm, albeit extremely small, to both the user and those associated with the user (Bonomo et al., 2019). Instead, what is being argued is that kava's nega- tive reports be considered alongside the scientific evidence, and that the risk levels be weighed and reported accurately. Although side effects from kava are rarely reported and considered to be minimal, when compared against the health and socio -cultural implications of even moderate alcohol consumption for instance,. kava rates extremely well. As an illustration of the potential harm caused by alcohol misuse in the United Kingdom, leading neuro - psychopharmacologist and former drug advisor to the UK Government, Professor David Nutt, stated, -when the harm to the user and the harts to other, are weighed up, alcohol is more harmful than heroin, crack, and methamphetamine' (Whelan, 2014; also see Nutt et al., 2010). Addiction specialist Jeremy McMinn continues 'alcohol is in essence a Class B drug [mean- ing it has a very high nsk of harm], but it is so pervasive and traditional that no one sees it like that' (Whelan, 2014). Castles (2015) reported that on New Year's Eve (2014/15), alcohol accounted for a tripling of personal injuries and poisoning incidents attended by St. John Ambulance (New Zealand).6 The observations of Nutt, McMinn and Castles together with the earlier discussion on Australian alco- hot and tobacco death rates, when set against the claim that kava is the cause of liver damage in winch kava hepatotoxicity rates are compared with Diazepam and Paracetomol/Panadol, need to be heeded. Since kava cannot he attributed directly to any deaths worldwide in the past 10 years, and the WHO reports kava risk to be at 'an acceptably low level', this suggests that kava potentially fits more with the side-effects of coffee, having an insignificant risk. Kava expert Dr Vincent