Why I Changed My Mind On Weed
edition.cnn.com
edition.cnn.com
I was never a stoner, and did not use it until I was 38 years old. I am happy it exists, because I was being treated with Vicodin for pain and was on a schedule of 6 pills a day. Enough that liver damage and addiction started to be a concern. I am allergic to pills in the Percoset family (hives and skin lesions) and I consume about 5 joints a day worth of weed. I don't even get high anymore, but it does help with the pain. It is costing me about $100 per week, compared to the $3 per month the Vicodin cost on my medical insurance. I could buy a new car with the weed money, but couldn't buy a coffee at Starbucks with the Vicodin money.
I hope the government gets around to reclassifying the drug soon. In the current situation, Child Protective Services would take my kids away if I was to consume the drug in front of them. A reclassification would enable more research, more research would lead to easier ways to ingest it. I find food products make me stomach sick, vaporizing doesn't work as well as smoking, and smoking is unappealing and difficult to do with any discretion.
I am fortunate that I can afford it, and can fit it into my schedule (I own my business). Many people need something like MMJ and can neither afford it, nor can they keep their employment with it because of widespread drug testing. While the state I live in says that card holders can't be fired for holding a card, it is a state that has 'right-to-work' laws and you can fire someone for no specified reason at all. (source- I employ ten people).
That seems to be the common wisdom, but is there any evidence that that's true?
At 5 joints a day OP probably has built up a pretty high resistance to THC. Speak to enough every-day smokers and you'll find they go on breaks every once in a while to address this.
>I wondered whether MMJ would fall into the category of "do not drive or operate machinery" whilst using.
Depends on the strain, if you're smoking Indicas then yes you should not operate machinery.
At work I avoid operating the forklift, milling machine, or anything else that could cause injury to me or my people. I still get a very slight buzz, but nothing at all like when I first started using it (think 5 or 10% of previous effects). I have had times when I consumed what I needed (four or five bowls) when friends were in the same room, and they have gotten high from just being there while I had no change. In general I consume in the very early morning and at night when I know I won't be leaving again before sleep. I avoid using during the day because most days I have to drive and work.
MMJ is certainly not a perfect solution, but it beats constant never ending pain (no drugs) or addiction and liver failure (opiates with acetaminophen) http://www.drugs.com/vicodin.html .
http://norml.org/library/item/cannabis-and-driving-a-scienti...
It's also important to note the most dangerous thing you can do, bar none, is to drive tired and unfocused. Which is very much legal.
Try driving on LSD. While drunk. And high on xanax. While shooting heroin.
Obviously, there are more dangerous states to drive in than tired and unfocused...
When you're on acid, you don't change as a person, your reactions don't change. If you see something weird you say "woah, that's weird" but, unless you're deep in a trip and forget you are on a substance, you can usually handle it like a normal person.
What you see is distorted, but everything you see is actually there. The walls might look like they're dripping or wavy, the branches on a tree appear to reach out at you, and colors become more vibrant, but you won't ever see gigantic bunnies or flying unicorns or some other stupid shit that often ends up in film depictions of a psychedelic experience.
As dosage increases, your mind increasingly tends to interpret what you're seeing as something else, like a shadow may appear briefly to be a person. When this starts to happen I would no longer feel comfortable driving, but for me this occurs at the peak of 500 ug + experiences, the equivalent of 5 standard doses. Not saying that driving on LSD is a great idea, but on a single standard dose it's not nearly as dangerous as driving after you've pulled an all-nighter IMO.
It's very discreet and pretty effective, esp. if you are looking for a more CBD non-thc delivery method.
Unfortunately these are a local Denver product right now from what I can tell (my friend in SF can't find them their yet outside of driving to Berkley); so it might be difficult to find outside of colorado. They also make a variety of cartridges including Sativa, Indica and Hybrid.
I've switched to using this most of the time esp. outside the house, or when the kids are around. When you exhale there is hardly any smoke either and I've seen people smoking these at bars openly. I haven't been so bold even though I have a red-card, things sure have changed fast, at least in Denver.
Edit: Also, the high effect is minimal, esp with the Sativa cartridges. Much more of a body, pain reliever type effect.
Edit 2: Cartridges are rated for around 300 hits, and at 40 dollars per that works out be a pretty cost-effective solution from a cost standpoint too. This might not be as effective as a mj joint however; I would be curious to know if you get one if it's more or less effective.
It seems to me the studies in the posted article are from a time when marijuana was dramatically 'weaker' than what you get today.
Also, intentionally-high-CBD strains are under development [1]:
"A high-CBD cannabis strain was developed in the 1980s by David Watson and Robert Clarke, American naturalists who founded a company called Hortapharm in Amsterdam to pursue their goal of developing plant strains for different purposes. (The day Watson and Clarke became expatriates is the day the U.S. lost its lead in the field of cannabis therapeutics.) In 1998 Hortapharm sold its seed stock to a British start-up, GW Pharmaceuticals, which has since developed a strain that expresses 97% of its cannabinoid content as CBD.
GW plans to test its high-CBD strain as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel diseases, psychotic disorders, and epilepsy. It is now in Phase 2 trials to determine the dose levels to use in clinical trials involving people. GW mixes its high-CBD and high-THC strains in a 1:1 ratio to make Sativex, a plant extract formulated for spraying under the tongue that has been approved in Canada and elsewhere to treat neuropathic pain associated with multiple sclerosis. CBD evidently bolsters the pain-killing effects of THC while moderating its psychoactivity."
[0] http://www.nature.com/news/2010/101001/full/news.2010.508.ht...
[1] http://www.counterpunch.org/2007/07/14/who-s-afraid-of-canna...
At least in SF the legitimate dispensaries do a good job of informing you about these things and finding the strains that will accomplish what you want.
For more modern up to date science backed information on CBD see projectcbd.org
CBN is not a primary cannabinoid, it's a breakdown product of THC and simply indicates how old or stale the cannabis is. It's primary effect is grogginess and general unpleasantness so you want to avoid it as much as possible.
Any dispensary that says CBD is good for insomnia is simply repeating long disproven but widely spread information.
It's the only thing that could cure my constant RSI/chronic pain after years of trying everything, and in the book he talks about fibromyalgia.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Mindbody-Prescription-Healing-Body...
The idea of psychogenic disorders would have normally have sounded like esoteric BS to me, but I ended up picking up the book at the recommendation of an ex-Google coder who went through all the same things that I did. I'm glad I did; for 15$, I completely cured myself after years of trying everything else (physiotherapy, standing desk, stretching exercises, working out, various books on RSI, ergonomic chairs, keyboards, mouses, trackpads, switching hands, etc, etc), and it turns out the book takes a very scientific approach to these conditions, even if it admits that there's a lot we still don't understand about exactly how our minds work and how they can affect our bodies (it's kind of an engineering approach -- we figured out something that works, now we need to figure out why).
Highly recommended to all those of you suffering from constant back pain, neck pain, RSI, etc.
> Dr. John Sarno caused quite a ruckus back in 1990 when he suggested that back pain is all in the head. In his bestselling book, Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection, he claimed that backaches, slipped discs, headaches, and other chronic pains are due to suppressed anger, and that once the cause of the anger is addressed, the pain will vanish.
Slipped discs are due to suppressed anger? What the fuck? I've been having back pain for a few years now (it returns whenever I slouch), but it started directly after a gym injury... what has that got to do with suppressed anger?
I found some of his advice helpful insofar as it suggests that mindfulness meditation can help ease tension-induced back pain (which I have found to be true for me) and that there is a mental component in overcoming the fear of re-injury and allowing yourself to resume your full range of motion without subconsciously tensing up.
As someone who struggles with anxiety from time to time, I can even believe his statement that he's referred some patients to therapy before attempting to treat their back pain.
All your objections are addressed very well in the book. It's not like he hasn't thought about those things and how it sounds at first. He came to his conclusions empirically by treating his patients, not by dreaming up some theory out of the ether.
I'll just re-iterate my recommendation for the book. It doesn't cost much and you can always get it from the library if you really don't want to spend the money.
I avoid books like this because they are almost all "wacakaloons" like you say. But this one seems to be much better. At least the entire first half of the book is the author making the medical case for his treatment. It is well cited, based on both his clinical experience and other studies.
Sarno doesn't claim that slipped discs are caused by suppressed anger. He never says that all backaches, headaches, slipped discs, and chronic pains are due to this and stresses the importance of getting examined before judging for yourself the cause of the pain. He believes that the pain from things like a slipped disc sometimes is, though. He cites a multitude of instances where people have slipped discs and aren't in pain.
Again, I'm not finished with it and am still a bit skeptical, but I would say it's probably worth a read.
Not really sure about this (I haven't read that particular book), but I will say that Sarno's theories cured my RSI pain, which crippled me for over a year. I'm not sure if his explanations of the mechanism for the pain are correct (they seem very hard to test), but I'm pretty sure the pain was all psychosomatic.
I once heard a Doctor describe psychosomatic pain. He believed the artierioles constricted with psychological stress. It's still real pain, but it will eventually go away.
I was deeply effected by nagging pain throughout my twenties. I went to Doctors, but since I knew where all the cranial nerves were(Chiro student), they didn't think it was psychological.
The American way to success(what ever that is) is Stressful. Especially, if you were the hard working type. Don't think you are invincible. The mind does break.
My use of weed has not worked. I used it for anxiety/depression but, it just made me feel anxious, and amplified any pain I had. But, everyone is different--try it--it just might work.
The first few (maybe 2-3) grows will turn out pretty bad, but it will still be enough to last you to the next grow. You have to find a balance in the nutrients and water which only really comes with trial and error, but the recommended dose is generally pretty close.
On the time issue: Once everything is set up, it's surprising relatively low time commitment. Especially if you're only growing 2-3 plants for personal use, you're looking at _maybe_ 3 hours per week for maintenance just to water every 3-4 days, prune dead leaves, sweep the area up, ect. I've also known people who use an Arduino or RaPi to rig a drip irrigation system which they can leave unattended for up to 2-weeks with no issues. Those growing for dispensaries in mass quantities are growing hundreds of plants at a time all at different stages and that is certainly a full-time job to maintain.
The nice thing about growing your own is there's no obligation to grow right after you finish one, and keeping the buds frozen preserves them completely for months until you need it. So, if you aren't looking at giving it up in the next 2 years I think its an extremely viable option which will save you money in the long run.
If you tell me how many grams you consume weekly or monthly I could give you a pretty good idea of where to start and how many plants you'd need to maintain that.
Source: I live in Colorado, grew my own in college with my roommate for 4 years, and have several friends still maintaining large and small operations I occasionally help out with.
I'm interested in hearing more about this, purely for scientific reasons of course!
Of course, with opioid tolerance there is no clear line between therapeutic and recreational dosages, and no way of setting an acetaminophen level that hurts one group of users but not the other, so in practice we have legally mandated poisoning of thousands of chronic pain sufferers.
I'm just curious as to why it took him this long. Medical marijuana has been prescribed in hospitals for some time with great benefit. I mean, just from a clinical standpoint, he should've seen the great upsides and limited downsides to using the drug. Patients, typically the elderly, with cachexia from cancer are often given marijuana to stimulate their appetite, and it works. Given its possible links with the development of Schizophrenia and the rest of its relatively mild side-effects, a quick and simple benefits/costs analysis should show that in many cases, its efficacy far outweighs the potential risks.
A huge percentage of physicians today, as indicated in the article, would be supportive of a move to legalize it. And it has been this way for several years. I just do not understand why it took Gupta so many years, having to go to the ends of the earth to dig up research from various countries to come to that conclusion.
My suspicion is that his initial viewpoint was more rooted in irrational bias and ignorance than in scientific evidence proving the drug's inefficacy. You can tell that by his mentioning of his children and how he wouldn't let them try marijuana, which is both irrelevant to the issue and an ignorant emotionally-charged argument commonly used when the topic of legalization (for medical use) is brought up. It's effectively "but remember the children!" The same could've been said for legalization of opioids and a myriad of other medications that have much more severe side-effects. And that really saddens me, because I've got great respect for the guy. I'm glad he's on what I believe to be the right side, but as someone with great influence in this country, with such an accomplished background, I feel he could've arrived to this conclusion much earlier, with much less data, and pushed for its medical legalization when the conversation was happening.
All in all welcome aboard, Dr. Gupta. Please be a little more forward-thinking from here on out.
And certainly, it's possible to have a lighter form of schizophrenia that is worsened by whatever factor.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychosis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schizophrenia#Criteria
Agreed that schizophrenia could be aggravated by pot; I was just disputing that you could "have" schizophrenia without having ever presented any of the symptoms. I may have incorrectly inferred this claim from the original post.
Yes you can, you can be genetically predisposed before the symptoms appear.
The higher % strains, by the way, are a direct result of prohibition. If a drug dealer is caught with an ounce of high grade that sells for 400, vs. an ounce of low grade that sells for 100, he gets the same penalty. Take a wild guess which one brings more reward for the risk. And this, my friend, is why you have higher THC %.
And it's assumed the distribution of smoking per capita didn't change by much. I think that's a good assumption; again, it's possible that what you suggested happened, but it's a bit sketchy.
I'm not saying that my hypotheses are correct, I'm just pointing out that if we're going to be scientific about whether cannabis induces schizophrenia we need to avoid jumping to conclusions.
The first is whether cannabis should be legalized and available as a business opportunity. You'll find very few people here to disagree with about this; there's a practically universal belief that cannabis should be legalized.
The second is whether cannabis is benign. There is a valid discussion to be had about how safe cannabis is. Having it does not imply that anyone thinks cannabis should be outlawed. Trans-fats, tobacco, and sugar are also not benign, and few people jump to the conclusion that critics of those substances are pushing for their prohibition.
Given that, its health effect is still important, as it impacts how much it should be taxed, how we allow it to be advertised and sold, and whether we should treat vaporization differently (as, all evidence shows that vaporization is healthier than smoking).
I'm not a pot head, and for that matter, I only have a drink a handful of times a year.. that said, I don't think that marijuana should be illegal for recreational use, let alone medical use.
BTW,
Schedule I substances are those that have the following findings:
1. The drug or other substance has a high potential for abuse.
2. The drug or other substance has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States.
3. There is a lack of accepted safety for use of the drug or other substance under medical supervision.
Tobacco fits this definition.
But if we are talking about medicine, then there are much higher levels of scrutiny on topics like side effects, interactions, dosage control, quality control, etc.
I really wish the debates were better separated. I think the legalizers have harmed their cause by exposing it to FDA levels of critical scrutiny, and I think the medicinal uses are tainted by association with a bunch of long hair hippies who just want to get high. (Hyperboly intentional.)
The U.S. made >6,000,000 arrests in 2011 [1] for the possession or sale of marijuana. Many of those arrested were incapacitated for an extended period of time (in custody), and had their life permanently changed for the worse. Even if 10,000 people a year get schizophrenia from heavy marijuana use, to try to mitigate this by ruining the lives of millions more is the height of absurdity.
[1] http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/c...
You could compare what you're saying to "my friend smokes weed and tobacco and got esophageal cancer, but I'm pretty sure it's the weed."
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glutamate_hypothesis_of_schizo...
I'm certainly not claiming that I KNOW what caused his schizophrenia. The point I was making was that I know how bad schizophrenia can be from experience, but I still think it should be legalized due to the huge harm of prohibition.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana#Concentration_of_psyc...
http://www.briancbennett.com/history/excerpts/thc-content.ht...
[1] http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-squeaky-wheel/201208...
I mean, why not make things illegal just for the hell of it, right? It's not like there's a whole industry benefiting from people going to jail.
"Much in the same way I wouldn't let my own children drink alcohol, I wouldn't permit marijuana until they are adults. If they are adamant about trying marijuana, I will urge them to wait until they're in their mid-20s when their brains are fully developed."
I'm assuming he's not referring to them medically smoking marijuana because he talks about a more appropriate age to start, implying that they'd be smoking it voluntarily rather than under necessity from chronic pain.
He's a media-savvy guy who was considered for surgeon general and has a career appearing on mainstream TV, including Oprah and Larry King Live. Someone like that can't afford to be too far ahead of the curve. I'd say this about-face means the marijuana legalization debate is ready to go national.
It's kind of obvious that these folks have the farm land, distribution networks, and a lack of morals (not that MJ is immoral, but it would require a huge about-face), so they could just as easily do weed as tobacco. Replant fields and create some new packaging and you're ready to go.
MJ, once dried, can be used with zero processing. If you consider drying to be processing, then yes, its a one step process. Not saying that these folks wouldn't make plenty of money off of the convenience factor, but the barrier to entry for MJ wholesaling is much lower due to the reduced processing.
I stopped using a long while back, it did not agree with me.
Should it be illegal? No, plenty of people are OK with it.
I wouldn't let my kids smoke marijuana the same as any substance that might cause maldevelopment.
Caregivers and patients are outraged because they feel like they know more than the judges or politician do, and I have to agree.
On another more general note about marijuana, I think most peoples perception of the drug is that out of a hollywood movie. In my own experience you can use marijuana to lose weight, as opposed to inducing the munchies, but generally people don't know that or expect it.
Medical marijuana is legal in more states than gay marriage and growing in all 50+ Canada and Mexico. I am so tired of the US lagging behind the rest of the world and not listening to the people.
Marijuana is safer than alcohol, and its time we treated it that way -quote from pulled commercial that was going to play of Nascar event..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7H8Cz9woC2A
Edit-- Additionally, here in Michigan we have real doctors that refuse to sign marijuana recommendation forms for fear of their contracts with hospitals and insurance agencies. Meanwhile we have doctors from states close and far recommending patients come to medical states to get marijuana. This leads to dingy doctors signing medical forms for patients they have little interaction with, which makes the law seem abused.
edit: Sorry, it was the red ones that were "banned" for a short time. The public was frightened of red dye, even though according to Mars, they did not use the red dye that was suspect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M&M's#Color_changes_summarized...
The US is terrible for substance safety. Dire. Awful. Hell, on the note of colouring, you still use bloody anthracine red, which has been banned for decades in the rest of the planet, as its carcinogenic.
So, I was a little unclear: I offered two arguments against the CRS/MSG connection: first, that MSG is a scary-sounding name for a chemical that plays a central role in our metabolism and nervous system; second, that studies have attempted to isolate MSG as a cause of CRS and failed to find a link.
My only fear with legalization is that it will get pulled from the grassroots production into industrial methods, and that in turn will lower its safety (as was the case, for example, with cigarettes and the additives in the paper for them).
If I were to start armchair theorising, I'd say it is because of cannabis' effect on the "linguistic center" of the brain. Couple this with nicotine - similar effect to cocaine in that it reduces the activity of neurotransmitter depletion enzymes - and you have serious potential for wild ideas that could interact with underlying issues to create disturbing problems. From the reclusive shut in, to the raging paranoiac, I've seen it all and I've often thought that the prevailing notion that the drug is benign is downright wrong. It is a drug. A very powerful drug. One to be respected and used wisely, and left the hell alone if it doesn't 'work' for you. But I agree wholeheartedly that it should not be criminalised.
The substance of the cannabis-schizophrenia claims is largely based on Nordic research (given the extensive surveys carried out as part of Armed Forces programs). Typically (or at least in the study I have read), the association is based on around 10 cases in 10,000. Note that these are only the people who tested positive in their bloodstream, not those who (sensibly) stopped taking drugs a few weeks before joining the army.
After controlling for various factors, they found a significant association between marijuana use and later diagnosis of schizophrenia. I believe they used linear regression, rather than something more appropriate like survival analysis.
The interaction with anxiety disorders I am much less familiar with, can you provide some links (preferably to the original papers, even if they're paywalled)?
We've had over half a century of malicious and premeditated disinformation on the topic of drugs--especially marijuana--and so forgive me if I'm skeptical of a claim which does reek somewhat of "think of the children!".
Working in psychiatry research myself, I definitely don't trust a single study out there that claims to have found a simple relationship between such incredibly complex things as moods, bioactive substances, person's environment, genetics, etc (same goes for nutritional science, environmental science, economics, and so on).
To me much more compelling evidence are anecdotal cases from my personal life. I know people who have smoked all the time since their teenage years and who lead happy lives, but I have also seen how people can get really messed up from pot and how it goes away when they stop (although occasional episodes and mood swings can persist long after stopping). Other huge factors no one seems to talk much about are interactions between everyday stress and smoking, between coffee consumption and smoking, alcohol and smoking. The list goes on forever.
That doesn't make it okay to invoke Chewbacca. The authors made the strongest argument they could. Some take that and bolster it as if it were concrete proof. If they really want to strengthen the connection, show some studies that reject the self-medication hypothesis.
>I have also seen how people can get really messed up from pot and how it goes away when they stop (although occasional episodes and mood swings can persist long after stopping).
People sometimes get really messed up without any drugs at all. As far as personal anecdotes go, I know more people who are recreational cannabis users whose lives are just fine than I do users whose lives are in turmoil. Of the recreational users I know who have suffered due to their drug use, the suffering can often be attributed or related to some punitive drugs policy.
I think the "medical" route is the best way to go. Yes, it is a bit of hassle to go and get a green card, but I hope it will help slow the corporate industrialization of marijuana.
Furthermore, I think that marijuana's proper position in society should be that of a medicine, not as a general intoxicant.
Bring on full legalization, regulation and taxation. It is overdue.
Again, that's the trick here. Legalization and regulation could still end up banning production at home or anywhere but crazy high-grade pharma labs and greenhouses--especially if, for example, you are now suddenly on the hook for tax stamps or whatnot.
Be careful what you wish for.
To the extent that we let this affect policy at all, its not to ban the products, its to make sure that (1) they are clearly identified when present in a composite product, (2) we very narrowly (usually as a matter of policy of particular facilities, which may be public policy to the extent that those are public facilities) restrict their use in circumstances where there is particularly high risk that extremely sensitive people might be subject to dangerous passive exposure.
I just don't think it necessarily follows that cannabis is safer in all situations than alcohol or tobacco. Legal or not, it's still not OK with me if my kids are using it.
EDIT: Also, I presumably wouldn't want anyone under 18 to use it, same as alcohol and tobacco (basically, considering college, the drinking age is 18).
I'm a filthy criminal.
Secondly, you can decide to morph that "hungry" feeling into a "full" feeling. Not quite sure how to put it, but you can convince yourself - a bit like when you're holding an ice cube, and convince yourself that it's heat you can feel.
That and an electronic cigarette. I just don't seem to gain weight anymore, nor do I ever manage to finish takeout in one sitting. Seriously, our food portions here are insane.
Can you give a list of countries that are "ahead" of the US in regards to marijuana decriminalization?
Lets see, there is North Korea, the Netherlands, and Uraguagy might decriminalize this year.
I am so tired of the "the US lagging behind the rest of the world" trope. It's the same thing with same sex marriage. The US has been and is ahead of curve when it come to sex marriage rights.
Even if we put Portugal in the "legalized" category (which the source I cited does not), that puts the list 3, possibly 4 when Uruguay passes their law.
Also, Hollywood movies seem to portray it as some cool party drug, that hippies and pseudo-intellectuals use. The drug is present in most American Pie-style movies, many sitcoms and animated series like Family Guy.
Personally I believe marijuana going mainstream is an engineered phenomena. Hollywood is able to create perceptions and demands where none was before. Older generations weren't miserable all the time because they couldn't smoke pot. New generations found out about it by the marketing.
Also I think your marijuana/drug law knowledge is a little behind. There are a number of countries in Europe and elsewhere who are changing to more relaxed drug policies similar to the progress in the US (including Portugal who effectively decriminalized all drugs in 2001).
Laws may be more lax in Europe but popular opinion of the drug is much more negative than in the US. But attitudes are changing largely due to how it is portrayed by Hollywood.
Anecdotally, marijuana usage was much more prevalent amongst students I knew when I lived in Canada than it is in the UK. My experience (admittedly while travelling through) in the US was similar to Canada. This drug-use map[1] corroborates that (US 14%, Canada 12%, UK ~7%), although I do agree that any survey about drug use will probably not see completely truthful answers.
[1]: http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/interactive/2012/ju...
Maybe (probably) I'm being overly cynical, but people like him have lent support and legitimacy to a machine that literally destroys people's lives for their involvement with a fairly innocuous plant. Oops!
Yes, you are being overly cynical. My guess is that you agree with virtually everything in the article, and, instead of being pleased that someone has not only come around to your position in the most public fashion possible, but also apologized for previously disagreeing with you, you manage to be unhappy about the prominence of the piece.
The impression you leave is that you'd be happier if he slunk off to hide somewhere like a petulant bridge troll. That might be more satisfying for you, but it's an outcome that serves the public poorly.
I think it's perfectly acceptable to question a public figure's motives when their changing outlook (regardless of stated reasons) are highly correlated with changes in public opinion.
I felt a strong impression that he had written this article for the same reason as he wrote the exact opposite 4 years ago, i.e. self-serving commercial interest.
But frankly, the convenience and timeliness of his argument is well worth pointing out. Speaking personally, I hold a special disdain in my heart for smart people that perpetuate the war on drugs for various reasons and then profess to stand for individual freedom.
In particular, the argument of not enough research, keep it illegal is the most insidious kind of argument because it sounds reasonable enough but inherently contains the opinion that we should keep jailing people until this research materializes. So yeah, when I get a chance to rub it in with someone like that, I take it. I guess that's petty, but so is jailing people for getting high.
No, of course not. He knew full well - probably on his initial pass of the data a decade ago or whatever if he's at all competent - of all the things he "discovered" in this article.
He merely sacrificed the health and comfort all of those people who could have benefited until now, in order to further his career.
This Howard Samuels (a person who makes his living off of a drug rehabilitation clinic) guy is an immoral shit who appears to believe that peoples' real medical needs are secondary to his opposition of "people just getting loaded". He is a prohibitionist. I am so tired of this ridiculous and harmful policy.
That being said, that doesn't mean there isn't good evidence for it. But, as with most things, we tend to believe the evidence that fits our preconceptions (and argue with the evidence that doesn't).
>He just was pretty clear on the fact that most of the users of marijuana are in it for the high,
I may be overly skeptical but I got the impression that he felt most medical marijuana users are just recreational users, and he meant for us to think that was a fact, but offered no evidence to support that notion as a fact.
>and that politically medical marijuana is more of a stepping stone for folks interested in recreational use,
Well, it is probably true that many people who support medical use of marijuana also support something on the spectrum of decriminalization:legalization. You can include me in that, I support both politically.
> rather than a deep seeded concern for those who need it medically.
Despite the fact that I support legalization, I do have a deep-seeded and personal concern for those who need it medically. As a teenager, I got to watch a close relative who I was very fond of die (in agony) of cancer. It is my personal belief that those in hospice who suffer from pain or are unable to eat, or whose care is complicated by the use of opiates should be denied no drug if it might improve their life/death.
As for lesser ailments than agonizingly painful terminal cancer, it appears IMO that marijuana is less harmful than almost everything, and potentially has a wide potential range of medical applications, and therefore it is immoral (and idiocy) to deny its use to people.
LAST TIME, he didnt really look at the evidence and was just regurgitating the standard line without really doing scientific analysis
OR
THIS TIME, this time he is just trying to jump on the bandwagon and get out in front of this controversal topic...
either way he doesn't hold to much weight with me, i am all for smoking ganja but the whole medical marijuana being pushed by recreational smokers thing is kinda perturbing to me
That seems like a surprisingly dumb argument for you, John, but maybe I just misunderstood it.
At any rate, the importance of the piece isn't Gupta's authority on the subject. After all, vis a vis cannabis, Gupta is best known for his former opposition to legalization, which is a self-evidently dumb position for him to have taken.
The importance of the piece is that Gupta was Obama's first nominee for Surgeon General, and the best known medical reporter in the country; he's doing a very public about-face on the issue just as the US appears to be reaching a tipping point on legalization.
Also: it's just a good piece, or at least an atypically good one for CNN. That's why I posted it.
I guess. I guess you are right. I probably should listen to his opinion about this. I just have a hard time with media personalities who are willing to spout crap when they don't know what they are talking about instead of simply shutting up.
Anyways far as I can tell his big revelation here is "yeah when i told you i looked at the facts before i really didn't but this time i did!". Makes me take all of his conclusions with a grain of salt.
Does seem clear indication that the american mainstream is getting acceptance for the idea of medical ganja though.
As for his neurosurgery practice... what? Why would you think that would make him an expert on pharmacology? Because they both fall under the wide umbrella of "medicine"?
Not that I disagree with him on this issue, but your reasoning seems incredibly shaky here.
So, unless he's intentionally and maliciously lying (unlikely), he presents plenty of good and valuable information, and as a media correspondent is probably better than most at conveying that to people.
Ideally, that's how it would work. In practice, it appears that in many cases, doctors do little research beyond what pharmaceutical reps tell them[1].
This seems to have a lot to do with time constraints. Doctors report spending an average of 4.4 hours per week reading medical journals, and they only read the full text of about a third of the articles they read[2]. On average, the FDA approves about three new drugs each month. If new drugs were all a doctor needed to read about, 6 hours for each one might be enough to get a decent idea of safety and efficacy. But of course, that's not all a doctor needs to read up on.
But of course that has no bearing on whether doctors know how to read scientific papers.
[1] http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11606-013-2411-7
If you're scientifically illiterate and generally uneducated, trusting doctors is a very good idea. If you have the cognitive tools to check their work, though, it is very smart to do so.
The annoyance you may feel when a non-engineer pontificates on a technical topic they clearly only have a surface level understanding of is similar to the aggravation they (M.D's) feel when patients who have perused pubmed and webmd decide they're better informed than they actually are.
I'm of the opinion that "trust, but verify" is a reasonable way to approach subject matter experts in other fields.
When your doctor is giving you opiates and not even trying to find a sustainable alternative, and you do a ton of research, find an alternative drug (with few side effects and no recognized potential for abuse) that has been shown to help people with similar conditions, and send that study to the doctor, only to have him say "Well, I've never heard of that drug being used for this, so no", it is... frustrating.
No, I don't think so.
What country is that, mistercow? Here in the United States, they cannot prescribe drugs with one notable exception in New Mexico for chiropractors that have received "advance practice" training.
In fact, prescribing drugs actually goes against the chiropractic philosophy that involves physical manipulation of the body and your body's ability to heal itself.
I have to take issue again with what you have said.
You seem to be equating osteopathy (a completely accepted medical science) to homeopathy (a complete quackery). To quote Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_MD_and_DO_in_the_...
Other than teaching manual medicine, the medical training for an M.D. and D.O. is virtually indistinguishable.
To quote the American Medical Association:
http://www.ama-assn.org//ama/pub/education-careers/becoming-...
Q: What is the difference between an MD and a DO?
A: A DO (Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine) is a physician just as an MD is a physician.
Please do more research before you continue to spread additional misinformation. Thank you.
No, osteopathy is not completely accepted by medical science. Osteopathy is absolute pseudoscience. Please do your research.
Yes, I realize that DOs undergo actual medical training in addition to the quackery that gives their field its name, but they are still taught the pseudoscience on which the practice was originally based. That they believe these techniques are legitimate medicine is indicative that their entire understanding of science and medicine is compromised. This hypothesis has been borne out by literally every experience I have had with a DO.
Let's also remember that "MDs" work in a field founded by bloodletters who believed in the four humors.
The important thing is whether the field is progressing via scientific method, not what its founded believed long ago.
Also, by no means should you take this to mean that I am giving MDs any special immunity. The only leg up they have is that I can't tell just by looking at the letters at the end of their name that their model of science in medicine has been poisoned by bullshit.
You would know this if you bothered to read either of the citations I provided. You and the person downvoting me apparently disagree with the American Medical Association that says a D.O. is equivalent to an M.D.
For failing to read my citations before you replied to them and for providing no citations of your own other than "every experience I have had with a DO." you are currently in the category of Ignorant Fool. If you would like to provide a citation or two for what you say and perhaps if you actually respond to my citations instead of around them I might be able to upgrade you to Misguided Goof.
EDIT: Never mind, I see in another comment below you are saying that you are just as suspicious of medical doctors. I have no further desire to discuss this with you.
You accuse me of not reading your citations (I did), did not actually read my response to your comment, and then somehow you got that out of my comment below?
I said that MDs don't have immunity. If I find out that my doctor believes in pseudo-medicine, I will find a new doctor. If you think that's unreasonable, then I guess this "no further desire to discuss" feeling you mentioned is mutual.
D.O's have an education that AFAIK is equivalent to that of an M.D. Why should they not be allowed to prescribe medication?
If you found out that your doctor had, in addition to her ordinary training, received training in psychic healing, and believed that this was a valid approach to medicine, how comfortable would you feel with that doctor being allowed to prescribe potentially dangerous medications to patients?
I'm sorry and I don't say this lightly but you should really just shut up.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Osteopathic_manipulative_medic...
In an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine in November 1999, researchers concluded that osteopathic manipulative medicine and traditional drug therapy resulted in equivalent resolution of lower back pain in a nearly identical time frame. The difference was that participants receiving osteopathic manipulative medicine required less pharmaceutical intervention. The advantage of osteopathic manipulative medicine was a diminution of adverse drug reactions while the disadvantage was the greater amount of physician time required for each patient.[22]
A 2005 meta-analysis and systematic review of six randomized controlled trials of osteopathic manipulative treatment (OMT) that involved blinded assessments of lower back pain in ambulatory settings concluded that OMT significantly reduces low back pain, and that the level of pain reduction is greater than expected from placebo effects alone and persists for at least three months.[23]
The National Institutes of Health's National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine states[24] that overall, studies have shown that spinal manipulation can provide mild to moderate relief from low-back pain and appears to be as effective as conventional medical treatments.
You are the worst kind of debater. You say something wrong, are called out on it, then you change the entire topic. Only you're wrong about that new topic too, so you cling to it to death. So now you're in the position of arguing against the American Medical Association, the National Institute of Health, the New England Journal of Medicine and frankly thousands of studies.
You are a colossal fool.
I think what happened here is that you overreached; you claimed that chiropractors could prescribe drugs, were corrected, and then scrambled to recover your argument instead of just admitting you were wrong. Now we're in a totally pointless and, from what I can tell, one-sided discussion about the legitimacy of DOs, despite the total irrelevance of osteopathy to the thread we're on.
It's a good hypothesis, but for the purposes of updating your model, I should inform you that your guess is wrong. This is a position I've given a lot of thought to. I know that a lot of people disagree with it, so I chose chiropractic for my argument, as it would have been a less controversial and more clear cut example - had I not been mistaken about their ability to write prescriptions. That was sloppy of me.
The difference between OMM and Catholicism is that Catholicism does not purport to be medicine and is not part of the medical curriculum. If it were a Pentecostal school and they taught all of real medicine, but also taught faith healing, then I would feel very similarly about that to how I feel about DOs.
Here's a test: ask the DO at your primary care office if he thinks that OMM is a valid medical practice.
But here, it's just a sideshow. Your point was that being able to prescribe medicine is not a big deal. Whatever you may think of the philosophy of osteopathy, being a DO is a big deal; DO's are doctors, licensed by the state to practice medicine. It is approximately as hard to become a licensed DO as it is to be an MD. DO's are not like chiropractors. Chiropractors don't go to med school.
You were wrong, obviously wrong, and it is clear that no matter what your underlying feelings about osteopathy are, this subthread is irrelevant. In fact, you're doing your opinions about osteopathy a disservice by hitching them to to this particular argument!
Though I suppose that also may not be something you'd want to know about your doctor. But as far as I know the academic rigor of his medical program was no less than that of any MD school, minus the inclusion of osteopathy itself. I wouldn't have any issues going to him as a primary care doctor.
But conversely it's unfair to criticize an authority for being fallible. At least today, at least in this case, Dr Sanjay Gupta is one of the good guys. Not for espousing one opinion or another, but because he's publicly changed his mind after considering more evidence. Maybe he has incomplete evidence, and maybe in the future he'll change his mind three or four ways from more evidence. But he's basing his opinion on evidence and telling you what that evidence is.
The British Chiropractic Association has sued science writer Simon Singh for a piece written in the Guardian's comment pages criticizing the association for defending chiropractors who use treatments on children with conditions such as colic and asthma, when there is little evidence such treatments work.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Singh#Chiropractic_lawsui...
"English libel law is so intimidating, so expensive, so hostile to serious journalists that it has a chilling effect on all areas of debate, silencing scientists, journalists, bloggers, human rights activists and everyone else who dares to tackle serious matters of public interest.
In the area of medicine alone, fear of libel means that good research is not always published because those with vested interests might sue, and bad research that should be withdrawn is not pulled because the authors might sue the journal, and in both cases it is the public that loses out because the truth is never exposed. My victory does not mean that our libel laws are OK, because I won despite the libel laws. We still have the most notoriously anti-free speech libel laws in the free world."
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2010/apr/15/simon-singh-l...
So next time around, practice what you preach, perhaps.
The Singh case flagged up a problem which drew massive support (which is still ongoing and should improve the situation some epoch). Also, he won.
Also, he won.
I think you're being awfully generous to HN...
But seriously, the key takeaway from articles like this one is that marijuana acceptance is finally becoming mainstream; five or ten years ago this kind of article would have been considered quite controversial for a major news organization like CNN, and may have been quashed at the editorial level.
Thankfully, it's only a matter of time before it's legalized and we can empty our jails of people who should never have been there in the first place for possession. The sooner the better.
Interesting to think that what is "mainstream" can be observed in what print-media outlet editors are brave (or un-scared) enough to publish. As you said, I imagine this would have been a pretty controversial article 10 years ago. Now, it feels almost like a me-too opinion piece from Sanjay Gupta, which is a big enough name on a trending topic for a CNN editor to call it news.
Gupta admits throughout that in the past, his decisions were based on incorrect information and assumptions. He seems to have a penchant for deciding "I'm against this!, here is the evidence that supports my point". Whereas now he finally seems to be coming around to the idea that maybe, just maybe, other evidence beside the evidence that supports his point should be considered. Perhaps he could even...gasp...put himself in someone else's shoes before making judgements based only on his own experience.
It's getting a little old hearing the "well I finally considered this from someone else's point of view and realized my viewpoint was insane" why does this take us so long?
I've written Perl code. Really, really bad Perl code. I would've loved to throw my hands up and say "let someone who knows their shit do this" but I was the only person, and the job needed to be done.
You have to understand that for media personalities, offering their opinions... that's their work output. You can shut up and still keep earning a paycheck. Their job is to keep talking.
Essentially what you're advocating is to have TV channels just broadcast dead air most of the time. Maybe that's what you want. But it's not really a reasonable suggestion. I guess we can have a laugh about it though.
Programmers are that way as well, even if they are not highly educated.
At his previous job, he might have been.
Now? Now he's an entertainer. That's what media figures are.
Like Ann Coulter or Rachel Maddow, or even John Stewart or Matt Drudge, his job is to entertain you with the news.
He's going to write about whatever topic that a lot of people enjoy, and make it seem exciting and new.
It's no different from what Oprah or Katie Couric do. This is the great secret of the news media and the voices for public science.
Their job is to sell ads by entertaining a majority of us. Truth and science are secondary considerations.
Good luck with that.
I wonder if one could synthesize cards that change color when exposed to MJ fumes? I bet you could sell those like crazy.
I think any drug that affects a developing brain can have grave consequences. I would love to see research that follows people who start MJ use at different stages of their lives.
It takes a large soul to admit, in public, that you've been wrong about something that has to do with your profession.
And he's right, Americans have been misled about hemp and its products:
I don't think the past goes away but generally I'd rather not condition people to not admit mistakes. And here I'd rather win now than be right now. Then maybe be right in the future.
Dude coulda, woulda, shoulda been surgeon general with that much influence i would expect this dude to actually scientifically analyze stuff before giving his scientific evaluation.
On other topics, especially in economics, the punditry is full of people who have been hilariously wrong for years, having made predictions a long time ago that have been clearly incorrect, and who still have never once even hinted that their models were wrong.
Yes, Gupta should have done his research earlier. But compared to a lot of the scum in the media, he is basically a saint. He deserves to be praised, if only to encourage others to follow his lead and admit when they were wrong.
Reminds me of the quote: If you're not a part of the solution, there's good money to be made in prolonging the problem.
Tobacco and drug manufacturing plants require a significant larger investment. So the lobby for anti-marijuana is strong and controlled by rich people.
There are only so many hours in a day, and outsourcing those hours for a little money is a perfectly reasonable explanation for how a real industry will pop up around this.
For that matter, look at Abbott Labs, one of the largest pharma companies in the world; a huge portion of their revenues come from consumable products that aren't the product of a drug research pipeline (for instance, Abbott owns the Ensure meal replacement product).
Stipulating full MJ legalization, cannabis and its active ingredients will simply become a new vector for productization by existing major health care companies.
They won't necessarily call it cannabis, it will be a "cannabis product" flying under some other name. Also, does the history of generic meds policy not tell you something? These companies are fiercely anti-competitive. Another case study in a separate market is how alcohol distillation, for instance, is kept illegal.
That said they did isolate it, so it's not parity, but at least peripheral.
I think the more persistent lobbies will be other "sin" industries - tobacco, alcohol, etc.
The one thing it doesn't touch on is the cost we have incurred as a nation by making it illegal. We have seen this before with prohibition, it didn't stop people from drinking it just made better criminals. Once we legalize it we can stop spending money fighting it and start taxing it!
Of course the funny thing will be watching all the farmers in Illinois plow down their corn fields to crow weed! Yes I am aware of what it takes to grown corn in terms of resources, time, and cost and at the current market rate for weed those fields would be plowed under in record time!
Wow. Ownership of a mistake. Rare to see on a 24 hour news network. +1 for Sanjay
Considering CNN's role (as a 24 hour news network) in forcing politician's to defend anything and everything they've ever said, I really like seeing something like this coming from someone within the network. Especially about something as absurd as the illegality of medical marijuana.
Renouncing a position that was formerly nearly universally held in favor of one that seems to be the new trend isn't actually that rare.
I do think he's doing the smart/right thing (now).
The same is actually true of alcohol. Unfortunately, the discussion has become so black and white (legalization vs. prohibition) that no one is even pausing to consider what is actually optimal.
I wish I could get this message through clearly: the crowd on Reddit could benefit from learning the actual risks. Yes, I am in favor of legalization or decriminalization. No, young people should not use pot or alcohol often.
It's hard not to scream at kids as I pass them in a part of the city where they - some of them not even old enough to drive - are burning away up to 10 IQ points. Perhaps if their teachers and parents taught them the real risks rather than fear-mongering nonsense, we would see fewer kids throwing away precious intelligence.
Thomas: how does this article accord with your comments here? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6158093
As this is also a contentious legal, social, and political issue, I worry that the currently 'better' level of discourse will be hard to maintain.
She was able to hold down a job, pay rent and had no need to beg or commit crime to fund the habit.
She also could afford to eat properly and was no longer at risk of acquiring disease through contaminated drugs, dirty needles or prostitution.
Also methadone is an absolute destroyer of teeth not least because of the slowness to provide a sugar free variety. It's also highly addictive in its own right I believe.
From the latter perspective, your heroin addict is a massive success story. She's contributing to society instead of being a burden, and the cost is low.
From the former perspective, this is a terrible story. You're supporting drug addiction!
The former perspective rarely works, but it's extremely common, on subjects ranging from drugs to crime to tax policy to education. It is IMO a cop-out, where you simply rely on vague principles rather than actually applying thought and study.
On the contrary, I stay the hell away from people like him, and he has a lot more to answer for than is satisfied by his upper-crust PR-driven atonement assigned to him by the church of TV for the purpose of lining his wallet. Same goes for Obama and AG Eric Holder.
How's this for Dylan?
Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could?
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul.For many years, Reader's Digest was the best-selling consumer magazine in the United States, losing the distinction in 2009 to Better Homes and Gardens...it reaches more readers with household incomes of $100,000+ than Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week and Inc. combined.
They've got the app market pretty well covered; http://www.rd.com/readers-digest-mobile/
I've seen many of my friends waste years of their college lives running around like stoned hippies, overeating junk food, and watching absolute trash with loud sounds and bright colors. To make things worse, it's considered a great "social activity", much like going to a bar to get sloshed with friends. Only weed is _much_ easier to get hooked onto, because it's much cheaper than alcohol, and you don't need much more than rolling paper (as opposed to refrigerator, soft drinks etc).
That said, many of them have had very eye-opening experiences where they learn a lot more about the world and themselves. They have formed strong social bonds on the basis of meaningful experiences, and have learnt moderation. They've also found it to be an extremely good analgesic and laxative. Ofcourse, there are sections of society that need it more than anything: chemotherapy patients take it for increased appetite, and people with chronic headaches take it to reduce occurrences (although LSD has been shown to work with an even more extreme form: cluster headaches).
Every substance in the world has a potential for abuse: there are plenty of "sugar junkies" who will live horrible lives and die a painful death, for instance. All in all, the issue is that of education: we need to legalize all these substances, and objectively explain how people can practice moderation. In general, enforcing hard-abstinence is a very poor solution; only repressive regimes should practice them.
Come over sometime ;)
Stop spewing bullshit. You clearly don't know what you're talking about. A gram of marijuana costs $10-20 and that will get 4 people properly stoned with some even left over. Meanwhile, I could go to a liquor store and buy a handle of shitty vodka for under $20. A handle will get you 40+ shots, which will definitely get more than 4 people drunk.
I am introducing another point for consideration.
My biggest concern is that people who otherwise wouldn't be criminal are becoming lifelong criminals by getting locked up for a relatively harmless substance. From a financial standpoint, our government needs to tax the substance so we aren't treating a large portion of the economy differently than any other industry.
[1] http://www.robertcrowlaw.com/blog/drug-crimes/oregon-marijua...
Even after the Feds remove it from the list there will be regulation governing its sale. You can grow tobacco all you want; most people don't because prep is much harder than marijuana; but run afoul of a few laws should you try to sell it.
It would certainly reduce the jailed population of this country and possibly even reduce the usage of harder drugs, after all if there was a legal outlet most people take the easy route
In many major metro areas, you're more likely to be ticketed for cannabis than arrested.
I haven't taken the time to come up with a conclusive answer for myself on the extent to which cannabis criminalization imprisons people in the US; maybe it's as bad as people think it is. I just think it's worth doing some research on.
"the proportion of state prison inmates who were sentenced for marijuana-only offenses rose from 2.6% in 1990 to 3.6% in 2000"
http://www.aclu-wa.org/library_files/BeckettandHerbert.pdf
The DOJ reported that there were 1,236,476 state inmates in 2000 (http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/p00.pdf). So 3.6% of that would be 44,513 state inmates who were imprisoned for marijuana only in 2000.
"King and Mauer (2005) estimate that at least 68,000 people were in prison, on probation, or serving a jail sentence for a marijuana offense in 2003"
So, that's 52% higher than the number I quoted for state prisons.
Its been a while since I saw figures, but last I did domestic violence was at the top of the reasons people were sentenced to incarceration (that is, if you did a ticker at the door, it would be the most common reason) but narcotics were the most common reason people were incarcerated (that is, if you did a count of the currently incarcerated population, drugs would be the most common reason.)
The difference, of course, is length of sentence.
I don't think marijuana is all that high a share of those incarcerated for drugs, but if you are using the prominence of the reason people get incarcerated rather than the prominence of the reason people are incarcerated as your standard, you aren't looking at the right issue.
Depending on certain attributes that in practice cause one to end up in cuffs nonetheless.
How many instances in a sampling size? How large was the sampling size? How rigorous was the study? Peer reviewed? Publisher?
Offhand, I can immediately tell you the overwhelming evidence is that tobacco (cigarettes) is far more harmful than cannabis. I direct your attention to the myth of cannabis being as harmful as x number of cigarettes[1] and the myth that cannabis harms brain cells[2]. While it does alter the brain, it is up for heavy debate whether it's harmful, especially on long-term use.
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_misconceptions_about_il...
[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_misconceptions_about_il...
http://brain.oxfordjournals.org/content/135/7/2245
Of course, you could have googled this up yourself in 10 seconds but I guess people believe what they want to believe.
What about my comments appears as though I just look for self-validating information and ignore the rest? The parts where I questioned scientific rigor, sampling size, case instances, etc?
That said, smoking anything is not good for you, but IMHO it's up to the individual what risk they take with their body.
That's what common sense would have us believe, but cigarette smoke is indeed much worse for you than marijuana smoke.
http://www.atsjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1513/AnnalsATS.201212-...
from the abstract:
>In summary, the accumulated weight of evidence implies far lower risks for pulmonary complications of even regular heavy use of marijuana compared with the grave pulmonary consequences of tobacco.
It is probably way better for you than cigarettes based on the amount smoked.
Also, many people vaporize their weed or use wick to smoke with - which lowers the temperature of the heat. Across the board, smoking weed is much safer than smoking cigarettes
http://norml.org/component/zoo/category/cannabis-smoke-and-c...
Well, I really can't understand how people can be addicted to gambling. Doesn't mean it's not a problem for some.
Marijuana--and indeed almost anything--can be psychologically addictive. As our brains operate chemically, it's a bit misleading to say that psychological addictions have no physical component. Dopamine, a neurotransmitter, is a key player in many (all?) psychological addictions. But to further complicate matters, dopamine is also heavily involved in the withdrawal process of some harder drugs, such as methamphetamine.
Because the line between physical and psychological addictions is so fuzzy, some professionals eschew the distinction. Still, it seems productive to discuss the nature and severity of withdrawal symptoms for each drug, even if we don't split the drugs into two camps. From that perspective, marijuana addiction is less severe than addiction to heroin, alcohol, and so on.
I suspect the DEA will sit back for a while on the subject of state legalization of pot, but at some point they're going to return to exercising intense control over the subject. This will not end well for many.
I'd also like to add that stimulants, alcohol, and psychedelics are some other classes of drugs to avoid, if you feel you are predisposed to schizophrenia.
Is this justified? Are cannabies, etc. really affecting badly people? If yes, then it makes sense for the employer to spend its money on tests. If no, it means that employers in UK are victims of some kind of paranoia against cannabies.
Not that this is necessarily a bad thing. Recreational users having a steady supply has no real social cost, and sick people getting the care they need has real benefit. But as long as we're going to be talking about medical marijuana in the context of science, it seems like we should compile some kind of statistics on this.
There are legitimate medical uses of alcohol, too. A great many people self-medicate, but it does provide them relief.
Investigating the medical science of the drug is important, yes. But perhaps investigation of the socio/psychological reasons is a red herring.
I'm all for easing the pain of people who have real pain issues, but it's abundantly clear people are abusing the system.
There is obvious harm in preventing people from having access to a drug which mitigates their symptoms. There is obvious harm when you imprison someone for a drug related crime. There is obvious harm when you prevent a business from legally existing and profiting from the sale of the substance.
Where is the obvious harm when a user recreationally uses a substance, whether they got it under the false pretext of migraines, or not?
But this is not the case, at least not in California. Medicinal marijuana primarily serves recreational users. Medical users get it by posing as recreational users.
By that, I mean that you don't get a prescription for MMJ by going to your normal doctor. You go to the doctor advertised in that shady free newspaper by the bus stop, in the classified section, just past the escorts. That doctor almost certainly "specializes" in medical marijuana, which means that he doesn't actually practice medicine, or do any real evaluation of patients. He just writes prescriptions all day, $70 a pop. Nice gig if you can get it.
(A Colorado doctor landed in trouble for prescribing MMJ to a pregnant woman. He didn't even bother to take her basic medical history.)
This article shares one couple's experiences, with one sick person attempting to go through Kaiser, and one healthy person going through "Dr. Herb Smoker" (the actual name on the nametag): http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2010/10/california-medic...
An excerpt:
...medical pot is readily available to recreational users while it remains inaccessible for many truly sick people who might benefit from it. My wife has no plans to visit Price-Less Evaluations, and I suspect that many people like her wouldn't consult the likes of Dr. Herb Smoker.
So there's your harm. The medical marijuana industry is targeted towards recreational users, in every way - from the decor in the dispensaries, to selling strains bred for getting high instead of getting healthy. Medicinal users are an afterthought.
For political reasons, the government decided that marijuana was bad - so almost all of the approved research went into confirming that decision. If you'd naively look at the number of papers or scientists who've published the opinion that marijuana is "bad", the evidence would appear overwhelmingly confirmative.
It allows me to land my spaceship. I see where I'm getting things right in life and where I'm getting them wrong. In essence, it's a great tool for gaining perspective on a myriad of things. It's not something to abuse, but rather, to enjoy.
It's time to let people make their own decision about it. They're fully capable.
Besides the damage to developing brains, there are more immediate effects on the mind, which are less predictable than alcohol.
Make no mistake: The "learning process" of a society that legalizes weed will involve deaths.
And eventually, can't the active substances be put into pill form?
It's evident what all of you get up to in your free time :)
For pain management and quality of life, we probably don't need to worry about the placebo effect too much; instead, we should just measure whether cannabis gets people off opiates.
This is something that could be major. My wife was in the hospital off and on this summer with stomach pains. The doctors couldn't figure out what was wrong (ran all of the tests, put her on liquid diet and the pain continued) so her doctor put her on OxyContin until the HMO approved a referral to a research university. The insurance declined the referral stating they wanted a second opinion, so my wife went to get one and the doctor wanted her to get off all of the medications. She did and almost killed herself the day after; the withdrawal from the OxyContin was terrible. If there was a way to manager her pain without constantly worrying about her becoming addicted or worrying that when she stops the med she will end up doing something drastic, it would be amazing!
This all reminds me of how some famous supposed atheists convert to a religion X and then write books about it selling millions of copies.
Same shit. You're being manipulated.
We don't need a mediocre surgeon to tell us weed is OK. Any idiot with internet access knew that for the last 15 years.
Plus you would be the idiot if you believed everything you read on the internet over the last 15 years.
We don't. The US government does. Who do you think they listen to more: the people or the rich and famous? I've certainly never been asked into Congress to testify for anything.
What is this referring to?