Brett McCracken, author of Hipster Christianity: When Church and Cool Collide (Baker), writes about pop culture for Relevant magazine and Christianity Today.

Medical marijuana is certainly helpful for people in great pain, many of whom use the drug in the same way they would use a pain reliever like codeine. The difference between codeine and cannabis is that the latter has a very distinct, largely negative image in culture—an image that carries baggage and connotations Christians must consider if they are thinking of using marijuana, even for medical reasons.

When I was in grad school, several of my colleagues smoked marijuana. I do not doubt that smoking marijuana relieved the aches and pains of my 20-something cohorts. But I wonder if “medical assistance” is the primary reason they were using it. More likely they consumed it in the way Oscar on Arrested Development did—enjoying “primo bud” under the auspices of the legal right to medical marijuana.

In California, the image of marijuana use, even for medical purposes, is mostly a joke. Pot smoking has long been associated with “slackers”—zoned out, disengaged, pleasure-seeking rebels always in search of a high. The image has even given rise to a genre of cinema: the Stoner Film. The image of those who smoke weed in these films is one of laziness, irresponsibility, and mischief.

The image of medical marijuana is not much better. Walk down the Venice or Santa Monica boardwalk in L.A. and you will be bombarded with leaflets for the dozens of medical marijuana dispensaries in town. Affable hippies even call out, “Get your medical marijuana recommendation here!” The dispensaries are more like recreational amusement shops than clinics for the sick, and the overall culture is one of “Here’s a sweet loophole!” partying more than anything else.

Given these connotations, Christians should be cautious about using marijuana. Marijuana is associated with vice and unseemly activity. Christians are called to be above reproach, “without blemish in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation,” shining “as lights in the world” (Phil. 2:15, ESV). We are told to “not be conformed to this world” (Rom. 12:2) and to “walk properly as in the daytime,” avoiding sins of addiction such as drinking and partying (Rom. 13:13). In 1 Peter 2:11-12, Peter urges Christians to “abstain from the passions of the flesh” and to keep their conduct honorable, so unbelievers “may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.”

The issue is not the relative danger of marijuana itself; it is about witness. If Christians use marijuana as a medical aid, it should be done in a quiet, private manner, without flaunting. Christians must be mindful of pot’s controversial and hazardous reputation in culture, and be sensitive to the perspectives of both other Christians and unbelieving observers. Christians should take note of the food offered to idols issue in 1 Corinthians 8-10 and strive to abstain from arguably innocuous activities that are nevertheless contested in culture. It is not worth offending or making someone stumble.

Not unless proven …

Dónal O’Mathúna cowrote Alternative Medicine: The Christian Handbook (Zondervan) and teaches ethics at Dublin City University’s School of Nursing.

In most jurisdictions, smoking marijuana, even for medical reasons, is illegal. Christians are called to submit to governing authorities (Rom. 13:1-7). Breaking the law can be justified sometimes, most obviously when we must choose between obeying God or the government (Acts 5:29). This does not apply here; Christians should obey laws that prohibit medical marijuana.

Since God is a healer and comforter, could medical marijuana be approached just like any other medicine? Paul advised Timothy to take a little wine for his stomach and other illnesses (1 Tim. 5:23). Alcohol can be abused and cause harm in many situations. Does Paul’s advice provide guidance to Christians on medical marijuana?

The key question is whether medical marijuana has legitimate uses.

Many patients say that smoking marijuana helps control pain, including the side effects of chemotherapy, multiple sclerosis, and other therapies and conditions. Butanecdotal reports do not provide the evidence necessary to show if an intervention is beneficial and safe.

The U.S. Institute of Medicine in 1999 and the British Royal College of Physicians in 2005 published in-depth reviews of previous medical marijuana research. Because most of the studies reviewed were not controlled studies, the report concluded that there is little evidence to support the medical use of marijuana. However, products purified from marijuana, most notably a prescription drug called dronabinol, appear to be helpful. These products are legally available and have legitimate uses.

In 2007, the first randomized controlled trial of marijuana smoking was published. Patients with painful HIV-related neuropathy smoked either marijuana or placebo cigarettes daily. Patients’ pain scores decreased an average of about one-third with marijuana. Since then, a few other controlled studies have produced beneficial findings for medical marijuana. However, these studies also showed that medical marijuana does not work well for everyone and has side effects. The prevalence and seriousness of the side effects is still debated.

Christians should approach the smoking of medical marijuana as they would other medical decisions. If there are good reasons to legalize marijuana, we can work to do so. Decisions about the legal status of medications should be based on sound research. Christians could act for the greater good by participating in research aimed at providing clearer evidence about smoking medical marijuana. If high-quality studies continue to show evidence of benefit, regulators should consider changing the legal status of medical marijuana.

When legal, medical marijuana should be weighed against other treatments that may be more effective. If these do not work or cause side effects, smoking medical marijuana may be an option. Meanwhile, Christians should obey the law as it stands.

Yes, with care

Ed Welch is a counselor with the Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation and author of several books on addiction and mental illness, including When People Are Big and God Is Small.

Ah, those Californians—a bunch of grown-up hippies single-handedly keeping medical marijuana in the national consciousness. But wait. My wife and most of her family are from California, and they all seem surprisingly normal. Maybe medical marijuana is worth a careful biblical look. Scripture raises important questions.

First, is it moral? This is the most important question. Does Scripture prohibit or command using marijuana for medical purposes? If something is illegal, unless Scripture commands us to do it, we do not. Where medical marijuana is legal, this is no longer an issue.

Second, are mind-altering drugs sinful? This one is a bit more slippery. Many prescription drugs—like psychiatric drugs—can be mind-altering, and so are legal drugs such as tobacco and alcohol. Christians have reasonable arguments on both sides. But I think we can agree that one’s motivation is relevant. If someone puts their hope in mind-altering drugs, and these drugs become a way to turn away from the Lord, they are idolatrous and wrong. Even then, that does not mean that the person must stop taking the drugs. It means they must learn how to turn to the Lord in their troubles.

Third, is it wise to smoke medical marijuana? This overlaps with the morality question. There are times when something is morally permissible, yet unwise. If you struggle with a desire for alcohol, it is permissible but unwise to work in a place where alcohol is served. With medical marijuana, that question could be reframed as, “Is it helpful or dangerous?” Are there deleterious consequences to this treatment? The brief answer, and I suspect there would be many heads nodding at this, is that every medical treatment has possible harmful side effects. In an era of full disclosure, many prescription warnings end, “Oh, and you might die too.” When you line up modern pain relievers, marijuana looks quite tame. It is riskier than Tylenol but safer than Vicodin. The dangers ebb when the marijuana user is terminally ill, and Scripture supports palliative care for the dying (Prov. 31:6-7).

Finally, is your conscience clear? Is it okay that people know you are taking medical marijuana? You do not have to announce it in front of the assembly, but you should not be ashamed if other people know. If your conscience bothers you, do not do it. For some people, the stumbling block might be that you smoke it. Put it in a pill form and use its technical name, and many consciences would probably be soothed.

Many innovations have unwanted side effects. For example, the Internet is a purveyor of pornography. Yes, more people will use marijuana for non-medical reasons. People who would not cross the barrier between legal and illegal might be more prone to try something that is legal though restricted.

How would I vote? Be wise and do not violate your conscience.

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**Teens lie about drug use, and so do their parents (National Post, 101028)

There is a huge discrepancy between the number of at-risk teens who admit to using drugs and the number who test positive for drug use, a new study reports.

In the case of cocaine, teens’ hair samples were 52 times more likely to test positive for drug use than teens were to admit to researchers they were using, despite being assured their answers would remain confidential.

But parents might want to hold the chiding: their hair revealed cocaine or opiate drug use more than five times as often as they did themselves.

“It’s human nature to not want to share things that you know other people will be unhappy with,” study author Dr. Virginia Delaney-Black, of Wayne State University, told Reuters Health. “I’m not surprised.”

Dr. Robert Williams of the University of Lethbridge in Alberta, who did not participate in the research, agreed.

“It’s the degree of underreporting that’s surprising,” he said.

Previous research has found that adults often underreport their own drug use. As the new findings show, however, parents were generally more honest than their children.

During the study, published in the journal Pediatrics, Delaney-Black and her team asked more than 400 black teenagers from poor neighbourhoods whether they were using cocaine or opiates, such as heroin or OxyContin.

They also asked their parents if they believed their teens were using drugs, and if they themselves were. The researchers then tested hair samples from teens and their parents.

No teens said they were using opiates, yet almost 7% of the time they tested positive for the drug. Less than 1% admitted to using cocaine, but the researchers found traces of the drug a third of all hair samples. For both drugs, parents underestimated their own and their children’s use.

Delaney-Black said addiction experts need to understand that self-report isn’t enough. “You can’t rely upon either what the parents know or what the child tells you,” she said.

But she emphasized that the teens in the study lived in high-risk urban areas and didn’t represent youngsters nationwide. They may ingest drugs without realizing it, for instance, perhaps by inhaling smoke from a user nearby.

Williams said the findings could be a problem for some agencies that aim to curb drug use, many of which can’t afford to test urine or hair in every at-risk teen.

Still, he said, most youth don’t use drugs — so when they say they aren’t, chances are they’re telling the truth.

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**More warnings about the dangers of pot (National Post, 100709)

Barbara Kay

A few years ago, I was treated to a barrage of mockery and derision from several members of the Post editorial board for suggesting that pot wasn’t quite the wholly benign relaxant avid legalizing activists insisted it was. In my May 22, 2008 column I called attention to recent studies that highlighted real and concerning dangers to certain at-risk groups.

I noted that in 2007 The Independent, a once militantly pro-legalization tabloid, apologized to its readers: “If only we had known then what we know today.” It was referring to a March 2007 study in the medical journal, The Lancet, that declared marijuana to be more dangerous than LSD and Ecstasy. Professor Colin Blakemore, chief of the Medical Research Council, who had been a proponent of legalization before, unequivocally reversed his stance: “The link between cannabis and psychosis is quite clear now; it wasn’t ten years ago.”

The gist of my colleagues’ reaction to this news was that alcohol and tobacco were also bad for you, so why not legalize pot, which admittedly is less noxious in its effects in the general public.

The gist of my response was that two wrongs don’t make a right. The use of alcohol stretches back over the millennia as an integral part of human civilization and remains, when used properly, a prime ingredient of civilized conviviality and positive social bonding. Alcohol in moderation is not only a social lubricant, it is good for one’s health.

As for tobacco, if we knew hundreds of years ago what we know now about its effects – never good, only bad – I would have argued against legalizing it as well. But as with alcohol, it’s not so easy to disband an industry as huge and profitable as tobacco on the grounds that it is unhealthy. There is too much at stake economically. So we’re stuck with it.

The latest studies confirm that the risk of marijuana-induced psychosis is real, and the most at-risk users are teenagers; regular teenage pot smokers seem to have double the risk of developing paranoia, hallucinations and psychotic breaks five years later.

“We finally understand that marijuana is not the harmless substance we thought it was,” according to Dr Leonardo Cortese, chief of psychiatry at Windsor Regional Hospital.

The vast majority of pot smokers will not go crazy, that is not what the reports are saying. Only 3% of the population suffers from psychosis, and it is unclear how many of those can be linked to marijuana.

What worries researchers is that crucial regions of the brain are still in development during teenagehood, which is when most regular pot smokers start using. According to CAMH, more than 30% of Onrtario’s Grade 10 students reported cannabis use in the past year. Add to that the worries about the vastly increased strength of today’s marijuana. Since the 1970s mainstream marijuana has seen a 25-fold increase in tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), cannabis’s psychoactive ingredient.

Dr James Kennedy, director of the neuroscience research department at CAMH estimates that of the 20% of Canadians that carry a variant of what is called the catechol-O-methyltransferase gene (COMT), some “10 to 15% would be at significant risk if they smoked a lot of marijuana, almost daily, when the brain isn’t fully developed.”

The big question for researchers is to know how much of psychotic illness can be prevented by avoiding marijuana. Depression, anxiety and schizophrenia all have links to marijuana, although in the case of schizophrenia, marijuana precedes onset. With depresson and anxiety, researchers face “a chicken-and-egg dilemma.” They are not sure if smoking pot sparks the problem or if smoking is attractive as a self-medicating response to the symptoms.

Clearly the actual statistical negatives of pot are very small. But what seems to emerge is that for a very small subset of the population, the risk for psychosis is high. One of these days it may be possible to test for that susceptibility as we do for allergies. What we know is that the health facts on marijuana use are not all in, and until researchers are as familiar with the effects of marijuana as they are with those of alcohol and tobacco, there should be no rush to make pot available in local handy stores.

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Marijuana May Reduce Immunity (950512)

NEW YORK (Reuters) —The major active ingredient in marijuana may reduce resistance to infection, according to laboratory studies.

Experiments with mice reveal that exposure to marijuana’s psychoactive component, THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), increased the animals’ susceptibility to the bacteria that causes Legionnaire’s disease.

Artificial THC likewise decreased the animals’ immunity to infection. The artificial form of THC is sometimes used as an alternative to marijuana.

For 10 years, University of South Florida researchers in Tampa, headed by Dr. Herman Friedman, chairman of medical microbiology and immunology, have been investigating marijuana’s effects on the immune system. Recently, their government-funded studies have focused on determining the molecular basis for these effects.

“We learned that THC increases the susceptibility of mice to an opportunistic bacterial infection that a normal, healthy person would resist,” Friedman adds. “This Legionella organism causes major infections in people whose immunity (is) compromised, including people with AIDS, older individuals, and people being treated with chemicals to prevent organ graft (transplant) rejection.”

In the experiments, mice infected with a dose of Legionella that their immune systems would ordinarily defeat became susceptible to infection when also treated with THC. The animals also developed increased tissue levels of cytokines —molecules that promote inflammation. The mice also showed decreased T-cell activity —cells that play an important role in the immune response.

But mice treated with marijuana’s non-psychoactive cannabinoids (cannabidiol or cannabinol) prior to being exposed to low-doses of Legionella did not show similar susceptibility to the infection. And when given these marijuana components at three to four times the concentration of THC, mice “showed only slight or insignificant enhancement of susceptibility to Legionella,” Friedman says.

The researcher notes that both THC and its synthetic version produced high levels of pro-inflammatory cytokines, “but the non-psychoactive cannabinoids did not.”

Friedman says the findings offer new insight into how marijuana may depress the immune system, and may have implications for marijuana use by people whose immune systems are already compromised.

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Two million Russians taking drugs, 300,000 addicts (970723)

MOSCOW, July 22 (Reuter) -About two million Russians are taking illegal drugs and more than 300,000 of them addicts, Interior Ministry officials told Interfax news agency on Tuesday.

Last year there were five times as many recorded drug-related crimes as in 1990, Interfax said, without giving figures. Russian police and customs officials seized more than 50 tonnes of drugs, it added.

The ministry also closed down 718 illegal drugs laboratories last year and confiscated more than three tonnes of drugs manufactured by them, Interfax said.

One such laboratory, found in Moscow’s Institute of Chemical Techonologies, had been producing up to three kg (seven pounds) of synthetic drugs a month with a street value of more than $240,000.

Last month an Interior Ministry statement put the current value of Russia’s illegal drugs trade, largely in the hands of powerful organised criminal groupings, at around $7 billion a year, 650 times greater than in 1991.

The world’s total illegal drugs trade is estimated at around $500 billion ($1 -5,789 roubles).

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‘Most ravers on drugs’ (970806)

ALMOST all the people who attend rave dances take drugs there, according to a survey published today (Richard Ford writes).

Of 520 people questioned at raves in the South East, 97 per cent had taken an illegal drug at some time and 87 per cent had taken one that evening.

More men than women take drugs at raves, with cannabis and Ecstasy the most popular. More than half those questioned also said they had had sex with someone they had met on the dance floor.

The survey, by the drug charity Release, highlights the links between the dance scene and drugs by showing that rave-goers are up to three times more likely to have taken drugs than others of the same age. Most reported more positive than negative effects but depression, paranoia, fatigue and weight loss were associated with Ecstasy and amphetamines.

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Medicinal Marijuana Garners Support From Legal Expert (970808)

NEW YORK — Patients undergoing treatment for life-threatening illnesses should have legal access to marijuana, says a legal expert writing in this week’s issue of the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).

“Doctors are not the enemy in the ‘war’ on drugs; ignorance and hypocrisy are, “ writes Dr. George Annas, an occasional contributor to NEJM and chair of the Health Law Department at the Boston University School of Public Health. “...Seriously ill patients (and their physicians) should have access to whatever they need to fight for their lives.”

Annas’ comments add to the continuing debate over the restricted legalization of marijuana as palliative medicine. California and Arizona legislators stirred up nationwide controversy last year after state referendums into the issue ended in the passing of laws allowing medicinal use of the drug.

California’s Compassionate Use Act of 1996 states that “...no physician in this state shall be punished, or denied any right or privilege, for having recommended marijuana to a patient for medical purposes.” The Act lists those purposes as treatment against “...cancer, anorexia, AIDS, chronic pain, spasticity, glaucoma, arthritis, migraine, or any other illness for which marijuana provides relief.”

But federal government reaction to the state initiatives was highly critical. “Nothing has changed,” said Barry McCaffrey, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, in December of last year. He said the California wording (“any other illness”) “...includes recalling forgotten memories, cough suppressants, Parkinson’s disease, writer’s cramp. This is not medicine. This is a Cheech and Chong show.”

Attorney General Janet Reno backed up McCaffrey’s opposition to the state legislation by vowing that physicians protected by the new state laws are still liable to federal prosecution. She said pot-prescribing doctors risk both the loss of their professional registration with the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), as well as exclusion from participation in Medicaid and Medicare.

Annas calls the federal government reaction “political posturing.” He agrees with NEJM Editor-in-Chief Dr. Jerome Kassirer, who recently wrote an editorial in which he called the legal restriction of physician-prescribed marijuana “misguided, heavy-handed, and inhumane.”

Both Kassirer and Annas advocate the reclassification of marijuana from Schedule I drug listing (drugs with a high potential for abuse and no currently acceptable medical use) to less-restricted Schedule II (medical use) status. Annas believes that movement of the drug to Schedule II does not necessarily signal its social acceptance. He points out that medicinal cocaine has been a Schedule II drug for years.

A group of California physicians have already filed suit against the federal government, claiming that the Clinton administration position violates free speech rights regarding physician-patient communications. Annas believes “the California physicians are on strong legal ground with their lawsuit, and they should prevail.” Indeed, a preliminary ruling by a district court judge has already put a temporary halt to DEA actions against California doctors who may have advised patients to use marijuana to ease disease symptoms or the side-effects of disease treatment.

Annas believes he has much of the medical establishment on his side. Contrary to DEA claims that only a “fringe group” of oncologists believe marijuana can help ease chemotherapy side-effects, Annas says a 1990 American Society of Clinical Oncologists survey found that “44% of (oncologists polled) reported that they had recommended marijuana to at least one patient.”

Annas says that the federal government could easily verify (or disprove) claims that marijuana has valid medicinal uses, if it would only agree to fund appropriate research. However, he says the (federal) “National Institutes of Health has consistently refused to fund (such) research. In the wake of the California proposition, this position is no longer tenable.”

Annas also rejects arguments that medical use of marijuana sends the wrong message to children, especially the belief that young people might use this ‘gateway’ drug and get hooked on more harmful substances. He cites a 1994 survey, which found that 17% of current marijuana users had tried cocaine. “...One way to interpret (this data) is that 83% of pot smokers, or five out of six, never try cocaine,” writes Annas. “Honesty is likely to make a greater and more lasting impression on our children than political posturing and hysteria.”

In any case, Annas believes opposition to the legalization of marijuana among the general public is “not a good reason to keep it from patients who are suffering.”

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More pre-teens have friends using drugs (970813)

WASHINGTON (AP) —The percentage of pre-teens who know a friend or classmate who has used illegal drugs such as cocaine and heroin more than doubled between 1996 and 1997, a university study said Wednesday.

The survey, sponsored by the Commission on Substance Abuse Among America’s Adolescents, found that 23.5% of 12-year-olds said they knew someone who used such hard drugs —a 122% increase from last year.

In 1996, just 10.6% of 12-year-olds said they knew a drug user.

The survey also found support for the theory that teen-agers who use cigarettes, alcohol or marijuana —so-called gateway drugs —run a greater risk of abusing harder drugs as they get older.

“The younger the child using these substances, the more likely his future life course will be seriously damaged by them,” said the Rev. Edward Malloy, President of the University of Notre Dame and the panel’s chairman.

The commission was created two years ago by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.

Joseph Califano, former secretary of Health, Education and Welfare who heads the Columbia center, said Wednesday on NBC’s “Today” show that the drug problem must be attacked locally.

“This is not a problem for Washington. This is a problem for parents, for schools, for churches,” he said. “Almost three-fourths of the kids —15-, 16-and 17-year-olds and their parents —say their schools are not drug free. A drug-free school in America is an oxymoron. We have to do something about that. We have to do it locally where the parents are, in the family, in the community. That’s where the battle is going to be fought.”

An abbreviated version of the survey conducted by The Luntz Research Cos. was released Wednesday. The entire study, based on telephone interviews in June and July with a random sample of 1,115 teens between ages 12 and 17, will be released early next month.

The survey has an error margin of plus or minus 3.1%age points.

Barry McCaffrey, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said the findings show “we have a great amount of work to do.”

“It is another wake-up call that we have not changed youth attitudes about drugs which, if unchecked, presage future use,” McCaffrey said.

Last week, the government reported a slight decline in alcohol and marijuana use among 12-to 15-year-olds, after a period of growth.

The government also found that more teen-agers had tried heroin for the first time last year than ever before. The Columbia University study showed that teen heroin use had doubled between 1991 and 1996.

The commission’s survey also analyzed federal data to determine the statistical relationship between the use of gateway drugs alone and other controlled substances, such as cocaine, heroin and acid.

The research found that 12-to 17-year-olds who drank alcohol or smoked cigarettes at least once in the past month and who had no other behavior problems, such as fighting or carrying a weapon, were 30 times more likely to smoke marijuana. Girls were more likely to take up marijuana than boys.

It also found that teens in the category were 17 times likelier to use another drug, such as cocaine, heroin or acid.

Boys were more inclined to move on to harder substances than girls, the report said.

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Surgeon General Disappointed by Needle Exchange Decision (980427)

WASHINGTON (AP) — New Surgeon General David Satcher said he’s disappointed by the Clinton administration’s decision not to use federal money for needle exchange programs.

“We said very clearly that they do not increase drug use,” he said in an interview Friday. “It would be great if we could do it without the political overtones.”

Studies have shown that AIDS-fighting programs that provide clean needles to drug users prevent the spread of HIV without increasing drug use. However, the White House this week decided against federally funding such programs.

Satcher, who took office two months ago, has supported needle exchange programs since he was director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. His stance on the issue was one of several criticized by Senate conservatives opposed to his nomination.

Such programs provide clean needles to drug users in exchange for used — possibly contaminated — ones.

President Clinton’s science advisers had wanted to lift the ban on federal money for needle exchange programs. At the last minute, however, the White House sided with opponents, including Clinton’s drug policy chief, Barry McCaffrey.

On Friday, members of the Congressional Black Caucus called for McCaffrey’s resignation.

“This is a life-and-death issue,” said Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif. “You can save lives with needle exchange distribution as we try to work at getting rid of drugs in our society.”

In response, McCaffrey said black leaders should think twice before endorsing needle exchange programs in neighborhoods where drugs are rampant.

“If you’re a parent already fighting to bring your children up right and protect them from drugs, you have to ask: ‘Do I want one of these programs on my corner or near my child’s school?”‘ he said in a statement.

White House spokesman Mike McCurry added that the president supports McCaffrey and is confident in the needle exchange decision. “The president is very supportive of the work that he’s done,” McCurry said.

Studies suggest that half of all people who contract HIV are infected by using dirty needles, having sex with injecting drug users or being born to infected addicts.

The government reported this week that HIV infections have remained relatively steady over time, despite an historic drop in AIDS cases and deaths because of new drugs.

The CDC report also found minorities making up a larger proportion of the infected population, something the Congressional Black Caucus seized on Friday as it denounced the administration’s decision.

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Drug Addiction Carries Genetic Component (980513)

LONDON — Genetic factors may influence a person’s vulnerability to drug addiction, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.

Dr Rene Hen and colleagues at Columbia University in New York found that mice lacking an important brain protein had a stronger response and sensitivity to cocaine than normal mice.

The finding could help scientists better understand the molecular basis of human drug addiction and how to counteract it.

In a report in the scientific journal Nature, Hen described how mice without the 1‑B receptor for the brain signalling neurotransmitter serotonin were more susceptible to the addictive properties of cocaine.

The loss of the receptor seemed to have caused long‑term changes in the brains of the mutant mice that were similar to changes in normal mice that had become sensitized to cocaine.

“These results provide the first definitive evidence for the involvement of a specific serotonin receptor in processes that may underlie cocaine addiction,” Francis White of Finch University of Health Sciences in Chicago said in an accompanying commentary.

The addictive elements of cocaine and other drugs are connected with the release of another neurotransmitter, called dopamine, which controls motivation and feelings of pleasure in the brain.

Serotonin influences mood and appetite and can interfere with dopamine to modify the effects of drugs.

“Results from these experiments indicated that certain effects of cocaine could be mimicked by stimulating the serotonin‑1B receptors, and that blocking the receptors might reduce the effects of cocaine,” White said.

During the experiments, the mice were trained to self‑administer cocaine by pressing on a lever. The researchers, who gradually increased the number of levers for the drug delivery, found that mice lacking the 1‑B receptor received twice as much cocaine as the normal mice.

Hen also noted that the mutant mice were more impulsive, a characteristic that is often associated with drug abuse.

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Medical marijuana measures fine-tuned to attract voters’ compassion (981022)

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — When Alaskans voted to end more than a decade of legal marijuana smoking in 1990, the question was so hotly contested that pot got more votes than the man elected governor.

Eight years later, Alaskans — along with voters in Nevada, Washington, Oregon and the District of Columbia — will decide whether to make the drug legal again, but only for persons suffering from one of a short list of specific ailments.

Similar measures appear on ballots in Arizona and Colorado, but Colorado’s initiative has been declared invalid for lack of approved petition signatures.

Advocates hope the initiatives’ narrow focus on medical applications will appeal to voter compassion and evoke images of solace, of pain eased, of appetite restored and body-wracking nausea quieted.

Opponents, however, raise fears that the measures are just a wedge to loosen the nation’s drug laws.

“I think that this is despicable, that they’re using the sick and the dying to get their foot in the door to legalize drugs,” said Marie Majewske, who campaigned to recriminalize marijuana in Alaska after a state Supreme Court ruling had made it legal for 15 years.

Passage “would be a dangerous step backward in the fight against crime in our nation’s cities,” said District of Columbia Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey. Ramsey is president of the Major City Chiefs Association, an organization of the chiefs of police in the 52 largest cities in the United States and Canada. The association voted Monday to oppose the marijuana ballot initiatives.

Criticism that the laws were too vague or that medical use would open the door to open use of pot, LSD and heroin helped sink or stall earlier legalization efforts, and advocates this year have taken care to fine-tune the proposals.

The new proposals spell out specific ailments that warrant use of marijuana. Three measures — in Alaska, Oregon and Nevada — would establish state registries of patients entitled to use it. In Alaska and Oregon, patients could get identification cards to ward off arrest.

The laws would require patients to get a doctor’s recommendation that marijuana will help one or more of a list of illnesses that includes cancer, AIDS, glaucoma, chronic pain, seizures and muscle spasms.

“I’m not a refugee from the hemp fest,” said Dr. Richard Bayer, an internist who sponsored the Oregon initiative. “This would help patients and this would help doctors who want to help patients.”

California voters approved the cultivation and use of medicinal marijuana in 1996, but the U.S. Justice Department and state Attorney General Dan Lungren have successfully limited the law’s effects by persuading judges to close most of the clubs where patients bought their pot. The latest to be shuttered is a 2,200-member club in Oakland, where the City Council last week declared a public-health emergency and said it would find some other way to distribute pot to the ailing.

An Arizona measure to legalize marijuana and 115 other drugs for medical use passed in 1996 but was thwarted the following year when legislators barred doctors from prescribing the drugs without federal approval.

A measure on the Nov. 3 ballot backs the Legislature’s bill. If it fails, the initiative Arizonans passed two years ago would take effect.

And last year, 60% of Washington voters defeated an initiative that would have legalized a variety of drugs for medical use after opponents raised the specter of legalized heroin.

This time around, opponents say the safeguards written into the 1998 initiatives are still insufficient. They note the measures would keep police from seizing or destroying marijuana and growing equipment until users have a chance to prove they had it legally.

“I think it was intentionally designed, and designed well, to thwart any kind of police intervention,” said Multnomah County Sheriff Dan Noelle, an opponent of Oregon’s measure.

Opponents also protest the funding behind most of the initiative campaigns. Three wealthy donors — philanthropist George Soros of New York, insurance tycoon Peter Lewis of Cleveland and John Sperling, founder of the University of Phoenix — have poured more than $1.6 million into campaigns coordinated by Americans for Medical Rights, the group behind California’s successful ballot initiative in 1996.

The group, based in Los Angeles, is assisting all of the campaigns except for those in Arizona and the District of Columbia.

“My question would be: Who’s funding this effort, is it outside interests?” Majewske said. “I can’t believe the people of this state would be essentially bullied into thinking that this was good policy.”

Recent polls in Alaska, Oregon and Washington show most voters support the measures; Nevada appears to be a close call. The Arizona initiative that would back legislative dismantling of legalization seems to be trailing.

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When Sex and Drugs Become Dangerously Intertwined (990512)

NEW YORK — A married man in his 60s — let’s call him Don — went to a treatment program to deal with his cocaine problem. He successfully completed the program and was sent to an outpatient treatment facility.

But on the way to the facility, Don popped a Viagra pill. Although Viagra is not a narcotic, once he took it, he started thinking about sex and his favorite accompaniment to sex: cocaine.

Next thing he knew, Don had bought some cocaine, solicited a prostitute and found himself right back in the middle of his addiction.

His story is an example of a phenomenon that is often overlooked in dealing with addiction: people who abuse drugs and sex together in an addictive, ritualistic cycle. It is a habit that often proves impossible to break unless both the sexual and substance-abuse aspects are addressed.

“About 50% of cocaine users and something like 70% of amphetamine users also use sex compulsively,” said Jennifer P. Schneider, M.D., a Tuscon, Ariz., addiction specialist who presented Don’s story as a case study at the American Society of Addiction Medicine conference April 30.

While this sex-drug combination is one that addiction experts have been treating for a while, they are now faced with a new, dangerous addition to the mix: Viagra.

A Dangerous Addition to Addiction

Viagra abuse is becoming increasingly serious, said Dr. John Sealy of Del Amo Hospital, an addictions treatment facility in Torrance, Calif., because it removes the “brakes” that were always built into sex-drug rituals.

“In the past, as you began to use more and more alcohol, cocaine and crystal methamphetamine,” — the three substances most commonly used to enhance sex — “erectile dysfunction became increasingly a problem,” Sealy explained. “It reduced the issue of sexually transmitted diseases and HIV because there was no ability to penetrate.”

“Unfortunately, on the negative side of Viagra, you now have a situation where a person who is supremely impaired [in] functioning, judgment and decision-making [who] is now having an erection for three or four hours and then taking another Viagra for three or four hours and another Viagra for three or four hours while they’re on crystal meth, which by the way lasts for three days sometimes,” Sealy continued.

This is almost exactly what happened with Don. He would disappear from home for two days, find a prostitute, get a hotel room and start doing cocaine and Viagra, Schneider told the conference.

“Normally, a [cocaine] binge like that might stop when a person just couldn’t perform sexually anymore, but the risk with Viagra is, you can continue with the sexual arousal, excitement and the performance for much longer.”

Sometimes, Viagra even allows addicts to act out sexually to the point where they physically injure themselves.

One of Sealy’s patients, for example, would get drunk, use cocaine, take Viagra and smoke cigarettes, then watch pornographic videos and masturbate to the point where his was sore and raw.

Other sex-drug addicts, who act out with partners, not only injure themselves physically but increase their risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases or HIV due to the increased possibilities for repeated penetration.

This is especially true in a certain subset of the gay male community, Sealy said, where men go to “circuit parties” and sometimes have multiple sexual encounters while using crystal meth, cocaine and other drugs such as ecstasy and GHB (gamma hydroxyl buterate).

Viagra, when added to this mix, allows “penetration by multiple partners, multiple times,” Sealy said. “It also increases blood flow to the perineum area (the area between the anus and the scrotum), so that if one is receiving anal sex, the amount of blood supply is increased so much that it also increases the risk of HIV transmission or transfer of an STD.”

New Problems, New Solutions

The new challenges created by the increased use of Viagra along with other so-called “sex drugs” is forcing addiction specialists to increasingly recognize that treating addiction involves more than addressing substance abuse.

Addiction specialists are increasingly looking for “co-addictions” that are masked behind or alternate with the more obvious addiction. “It’s very rare that I’ve ever seen an addict with only one addiction,” Dr. Sealy said.

This view of addiction as a pattern of behavior intertwined with abuse of certain substances, Irons added, is based solidly on the latest developments in brain research (see sidebar). “Together, all addictions trigger the same underlying brain reward mechanisms that produce addictive behavior. That’s why the behavior itself, and the rituals which surround it, are so important.”

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Teen Drug Use Falls After Rising Through 1990s (990818)

WASHINGTON — Teen drug use fell last year, with about one in 10 teen-agers using marijuana and other drugs, the government reported today. Officials say it’s solid evidence that the nation has turned a corner after rising drug use through the mid-1990s.

Overall, drug use among Americans of all ages remained level, but use among young adults continued its steady rise, according to the annual household survey of 25,500 people ages 12 and up.

All told, 78 million Americans had tried illegal drugs at some point in their lives. Marijuana remained far and away the most popular drug, but 41.3 million Americans also had tried another heroin, cocaine or some other illegal drug, the survey said.

Of them, 13.6 million were current users, about half what it was at its 1979 peak.

The survey results were released today by Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala and Barry McCaffrey, President Clinton’s drug policy adviser.

“While these results give us reason to be optimistic, we cannot let up on our efforts,” a statement from Clinton said on Wednesday.

The National Household Survey on Drug Abuse also measured cigarette smoking and found it down to 27.7% overall, the lowest rate recorded. But smoking remained steady among teens and continued to rise among young adults. Cigar use edged up.

The survey is most carefully watched as a gauge of teen drug use.

It found 9.9% of 12-to 17-year-olds had used some sort of drugs within the past month, down from 11.4% in 1997. A second government survey, which uses a different method to measure teen drug use, has found that drug use was stable over the past two years after years on the rise.

“It looks like we have turned the corner with today’s report,” Shalala said in a statement.

“We can really say we’re making progress,” a Clinton administration official said Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity. Earlier reports signaling a leveling off of teen drug use have been greeted with cautious optimism, but the official said researchers were now confident that the nation had “turned a corner.”

The portion of teens saying they had ever used drugs was also down, from 18.8% in 1997 to 16.4% last year.

The declines were driven by older teens — those ages 16 and 17 — with the percentage having used drugs in the past year falling from 30.7% to 26.8%.

Marijuana — the most popular drug — tends to fuel the overall rate, though its usage has fluctuated over the past few years. Last year it fell to 8.3% among teens, back to its 1995 level and still significantly higher than the 3.4% recorded in 1992.

Overall, teen drug use rose through much of the 1990s and is still much higher than it was in 1991 and 1992. Researchers attribute the rise to a relaxing of the intense prevention efforts of the 1980s.

Today’s news was not as good for young adults aged 18 to 25. The survey found 16.1% of them were “current users,” meaning they had used drugs in the past month. That rate has been gradually rising, up from 13.3% in 1994.

In particular, cocaine use was up, from 1.2% in 1997 to 2% in 1998.

Officials suspect that the rising statistics relate to this particular group of people — the same people who were more likely to use drugs when they were teen-agers, who have now become young adults.

Overall, drug use among all ages remained level in 1998, with 13.6 million current users. That’s 6.2% of the population, statistically unchanged from 6.4% in 1997.

But the rates have increased among minority groups. The percent of blacks currently using drugs jumped from 5.8% in 1993 to 8.2% last year. Hispanics saw a similar rise, from 4.4% to 6.1% over those five years.

Teen and adult drug use is driven largely by use of marijuana, which attracts nearly twice as many users as cocaine, heroine, LSD and other drugs combined.

Overall use of marijuana was steady in 1998, with about 11 million Americans smoking it in the month preceding the survey.

Other findings from the survey:

Heroin: A total of 130,000 people were currently using heroin, double the number in 1993. And the age of users was dropping. In 1997, the typical heroin user was 17.6 years old the first time they tried it, down from 18.3% in 1996.

Cocaine: The number of users was stable in 1998, with about 1.75 million, though there were increases among teens and young adults.

Cigarettes: Some 60 million Americans age 12 and up said they were current smokers, down from 29.6% in 1997. Among young adults, the percentage has steadily increased from 34.6% in 1994 to 41.6% last year.

Cigars: Use increased to 6.9% last year from 5.9% in 1997.

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Decriminalization of marijuana (Ottawa Citizen, 010529)

The main lobby group for frontline police officers criticized MPs, senators, other opinion leaders and Mr. Chretien yesterday for sending the wrong message about illegal drug use to young Canadians.

The Canadian Police Association said talk about decriminalizing or even legalizing marijuana is masking the harmful effect of the drug and minimizing its cost to society. Such talk has also made it more difficult to enforce the law, the association told a Senate committee investigating drug use in Canada.

“Perceived tolerance of drug consumption by community leaders, including members of Parliament, senators, editorial writers and even some chiefs of police, have all contributed to the elevation of thresholds for drug investigation, arrest, prosecution, conviction and sentencing,” the association said.

The lobby group’s executive officer, David Griffin, called on Mr. Chretien to make a clear statement about the harm of drug use to young people.

“I certainly think it would be helpful if the prime minister and others were to come out with a statement that said that drug use is dangerous,” Mr. Griffin said after he and two police officers from Western Canada urged the committee to come out with a clear declaration against marijuana decriminalization.

And as the police association testified, Canadian Alliance MP Keith Martin unveiled a private members’ bill that would take marijuana possession out of the Criminal Code and make it a statute offence with fines up to $1,000.

Late last year, a Senate committee was charged with undertaking a two-year study of Canada’s drug laws and has since heard primarily from groups that favour decriminalization of marijuana. Conservative Senator Pierre-Claude Nolin, who chairs the Senate inquiry into drug use, has already stated he supports decriminalizing marijuana, the position favoured by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, the RCMP and Conservative leader Joe Clark.

The Canadian Medical Association Journal has similarly called on the government to decriminalize possession of small amounts. A recent journal editorial argued that there are “minimal” health risks in smoking marijuana in moderation.

The rank-and-file police association, however, described marijuana as a “powerful” drug whose use brings adverse consequences such as respiratory damage, declining physical co-ordination, loss of memory and cognition, and harmful psychiatric effects, as well as health dangers during pregnancy and post-natal development.

“Marijuana use is associated with poor work and school performance, and learning problems for younger users,” the association said, adding marijuana is internationally recognized as the “gateway drug” that leads to the use of stronger and more harmful drugs.

Edmonton police Det. Glen Hayden told the committee he believes it is a myth that crime would decline with marijuana legalization, arguing even if drug prices drop, users will still steal to get money for their substance abuse.

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Cannabis smokers will not be arrested (London Times, 011024)

CANNABIS will be reclassified so that possession of the drug is no longer an arrestable offence, David Blunkett announced yesterday, in the first relaxation of British drug laws in 30 years.

In the surprise announcement the Home Secretary said that drug laws had to be credible, particularly to young people. He said that cannabis would be moved from a Class B drug to a Class C drug, putting it in the same category as anti-depressants and steroids.

Mr Blunkett denied that the move, which in practice will mean that cannabis smokers are unlikely to be prosecuted if caught with small amounts of the drug, was decriminalisation by another name.The maximum sentence for possession will, however, be cut from five to two years and the term for dealing in cannabis from 14 to five.

Police will no longer have the power to arrest a person found in possession of the drug. They will, however, still be able to carry out stop and searches for it.

Mr Blunkett also indicated that he expected to approve the medicinal use of cannabis and wanted more doctors to prescribe heroin as a way of bringing addicts into the healthcare system.

The reclassification decision is in line with the recommendation of an inquiry last year that was headed by Viscountess Runciman of Doxford. She said last night: “It is a very sensible and welcome move by the Home Secretary. It will make the law much more credible.”

Mr Blunkett’s decision is intended to free police time to allow them to concentrate on hard drugs such as heroin and cocaine, which are at heart of the Government’s anti- drugs strategy. He insisted: “I am not either legalising or decriminalising cannabis”.

He told the Commons Home Affairs Select Committee: “Re-classification would be quite different from decriminalisation or legalisation. Cannabis would remain a controlled drug and using it a criminal offence”.

Mr Blunkett conceded that the operation of the 1971 Misuse of Drugs Act lagged far behind the public’s attitudes towards cannabis and that keeping it just one class below heroin and cocaine was not sustainable.

He will put his proposal to the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, which is expected to back the reclassification by next spring. In the 1980s the council voted by a majority in favour of reclassification but no action was taken.

Mr Blunkett’s move was welcomed by Labour MPs, the head of the Metropolitan Police and drugcharities. Sir John Stevens, Metropolitan Police Commissioner said: “While cannabis would remain an illegal drug the measures announced by the Home Secretary reflect the growing reality that law enforcers must target the scourge of hard drugs.”

Chief constables are concerned at the prospect of losing the power to arrest some one for possession. The Home Office is to hold discussions with the Association of Chief Police Officers on the issue.

Paul Flynn, a Labour MP who has campaigned for drugs reform, said: “This is a wonderful, sensible first step. We congratulate the Government for having the courage to do this. Very few people will now be prosecuted for cannabis possession as a result of this. It’s the equivalent of giving the police and the courts millions of pounds in extra resources.”

Roger Howard, of the charity DrugScope, said: “It is very encouraging to have someone in office who is willing to engage in open debate on this issue and then to act.”

Oliver Letwin, Shadow Home Secretary, said that his party would consider the issue in an ongoing policy review.

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One night’s ecstasy use can cause brain damage (National Post, 020927)

‘Like Russian roulette’: Study finds drastic effect on neurons of monkeys, baboons

Just one night’s use of the drug ecstasy can cause long-lasting damage to the brain that may lead to the early onset of Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases, according to a study published today in the journal Science.

The researchers gave baboons and monkeys the same amount of the drug as is often taken at all-night rave parties. They found “severe” neurotoxicity and brain damage in the animals.

Doctors say there is a good chance the same thing happens in human ecstasy users, since baboons and monkeys are such close relatives of humans. And they fear the damage may be irreversible.

The findings raise the chilling prospect that thousands of young people who have used the drug recreationally may have already done enough damage to develop Parkinson’s disease or other neuropsychiatric disorders as they grow older, said neurologist Dr. George Ricaurte at Johns Hopkins University, who led the study.

Parkinson’s disease, which leads to uncontrolled tremors and loss of motor control, appears to be hitting more young adults.

More research is needed to prove a link between ecstasy, also known as MDMA, and Parkinson’s, but doctors are urging people to stop using the chemical, long considered a “soft” drug.

“Using ecstasy is like playing Russian roulette with your brain function,” said Dr. Alan Leshner, chief executive officer of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which publishes the journal Science.

“This study shows that even very occasional use can have long-lasting effects on many different brain systems,” said Dr. Leshner, who was formerly the director of the U.S. National Institute of Drug Abuse. “It sends an important message to young people — don’t experiment with your own brain.”

The view was echoed by other doctors.

“There is no way they should even risk it,” said Dr. Donald Calne, at the Neurodegenerative Disorder Centre at the University of British Columbia.

Ecstasy gives users a euphoric rush and heightens sensations and feelings of warmth and empathy. There have been deaths linked to ecstasy, including two in Vancouver last year, but they often relate to the way the drug is combined with other drugs. More common side effects of ecstasy use are depression, anxiety and increased heart rate.

Scientists have warned for years that MDMA changes the brain by overstimulating and damaging neurons that communicate using the neurotransmitter serotonin. There is also evidence of cognitive deficits in heavy users.

The new experiments point to even more serious damage. They show that MDMA causes “severe” damage to neurons that use and produce the neurotransmitter dopamine and are key to control of movement.

Dr. Ricaurte’s team gave monkeys and baboons three doses of ecstasy at three-hour intervals, which is comparable to what people take at raves. One of the monkeys died of hyperthermia — or overheating — and another developed the shakes. The four surviving monkeys and five baboons showed the drug had a toxic effect on neurons that produce and use dopamine. “These are not high doses and we’re seeing lesions of 60, 70, 80% depending on the region you look at,” Dr. Ricaurte said.

“We were surprised by both the severity and the occurrence of lesions,” he said, noting that “profound loss” was still evident eight weeks after exposure.

While the damage is obvious to scientists examining brain neurons, doctors say it would take years for physical symptoms to show up in drug users. This is because shaking and tremors associated with Parkinson’s and related diseases do not occur until a loss of 80% of dopamine has occurred.

“You can lose up to 80% and still be normal, but when you cross that line you get symptoms,” said Dr. William Langston, scientific director of the Parkinson Institute in California. “That’s why this drug could be very pernicious.”

Dopamine production slowly decreases with age, so it might take 20 years for symptoms of Parkinson’s to appear if taking ecstasy reduces dopamine production by knocks down 50 to 60%.

“If the hypothesis is correct [that ecstasy is causing serious, permanent neuron damage] we could see a wave of Parkinsonism as the years go by,” said Dr. Langston, who is also chief scientific director of the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research. The foundation bears the name of the Canadian actor who was diagnosed with the disease in his 30s.

The new findings “definitely merit further exploration,” said UBC’s Dr. Calne, who is trying to track down the causes of the disease. He has long suspected it is caused by brief exposures through life with agents that kill and damage dopamine-producing cells in the brain.

Dr. Calne said ecstasy can now be added to the list of possible culprits that also includes viruses, environmental toxins and a genetic predisposition to the disease.

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Crack use and violence at ‘disturbing’ levels (London Times, 020624)

Levels of violence linked to the trafficking of crack cocaine in this country are “very disturbing”, a Home Office minister said today.

Bob Ainsworth told a “crack conference” in Birmingham that the problem of gangs smuggling the drug from Jamaica “cannot be ignored”.

He warned: “The levels of violence associated with crack cocaine are very disturbing and they are very clearly linked to the supply of that drug.

“They are also clearly associated with a growing culture amongst young people who are attracted to the possession of a firearm and to the supply of drugs in a way they think leads to power and respect.

Home Office figures released last month revealed that compared with 1999 there was an 8 per cent rise in seizures of crack cocaine in 2000. During the same period the courts in England and Wales dealt with a 7 per cent rise in crack-related offences.

Mr Ainsworth said a “high proportion” of crack originated from Jamaica. He added: “We need to try and disrupt the gangs that are controlling that supply and are responsible for a large proportion of the conversion into crack,” he said. “So it is a problem that cannot be ignored.”

The aim of the conference was to bring together communities most at risk from the effects of crack cocaine so that they can fight the menace. Mr Ainsworth warned that use of the drug was spreading outwards from London, and across the rest of the UK - and that the poorest communities were most at risk.

He added: “The black community does have a problem. The levels of violence with the black community are quite extraordinary.

Joining the minister at the press conference was Commander Alan Brown, head of Operation Trident, with the Metropolitan Police. Both the minister and Mr Brown urged communities to work together to tackle the menace of drugs.

“It is only by working together that we will be able to support communities and give them confidence to reject the intimidation and violence to secure a safer society,” Mr Brown said.

John Witton, researcher with Action on Addiction, the UK’s only independent charity seeking out the causes of nicotine, alcohol and drug addiction, said: “Our on-going research in the probation service suggests that over 50 per cent of those interviewed about drugs are using crack.

“Clearly crack use is becoming more common in the UK, particularly in the major cities like London, Liverpool and Manchester. Of real concern to us is the link between crack use and offending.”

He said currently drug treatment services are largely geared toward heroin use, and while there is no “ready pharmacological solution for crack, like methadone for heroin use, we know that crack can be successfully treated.”

“We need to find out more about what approaches work best for crack use. The evidence suggests that crack treatment needs are best met with a range of approaches - ranging from counselling for those with more straightforward problems to more intense residential approaches for those with more severe needs.”

Earlier today, a leading police chief today voiced serious concerns about his force’s “softly softly” approach to dealing with cannabis.

Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, told London’s Evening Standard newspaper he was “incredibly worried” about suggestions that more children are using the drug in Lambeth, South London, where softer policing tactics have been used since last year.

Sir John also called for a “significant toughening” of laws against dealers who supply youngsters before any widespread liberalisation of the cannabis laws takes place.

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Vancouver Opening ‘Safe Injection Site’ for Junkies (Foxnews, 030627)

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — Canada will open North America’s first legal safe-injection site for drug addicts later this year, a decision that drew swift criticism from White House drug czar John Walters.

The so-called “shooting gallery” will be federally funded, a 12-seat facility where addicts will be given the equipment they need to inject safely under the supervision of nurses, said Viviana Zanocco, spokeswoman for the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority, which will run the program.

It will open in September in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, an impoverished neighborhood known for crime and drug use, under funding the federal government announced this week.

“They would shoot up under supervision,” Zanocco said Thursday. After injecting, the users will be monitored in a “chill-out” room to check for overdoses, she said.

The site will be exempt from federal drug laws to allow heroin and cocaine users to use it without fear of arrest.

“It makes us the first health authority in Canada to have this exception that hopefully will allow us to establish scientifically whether supervised injection sites can improve health outcomes and reduce harm to drug users,” Zanocco said.

Similar safe-injection programs have been set up in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia and Germany. While the sites are credited with reducing overdose deaths and the spread of disease, specialists say the effect on addiction rates is unclear.

Walters, the White House Director of National Drug Control Policy, said in a telephone interview Thursday the program shows an appalling indifference to addiction.

“Drug abuse is a deadly disease,” Walters said. “It’s immoral to allow people to suffer and die from a disease we know how to treat.”

He also called the concept “a lie,” saying “there are no safe injection sites.”

Canada already has irritated Walters and U.S. security officials with a proposal to decriminalize possession of small amounts of marijuana.

Asa Hutchinson, undersecretary for border and transportation security in the Department of Homeland Security, warned Thursday that such moves will bring tighter border controls against drug trafficking from Canada.

“We’re concerned about the increased drug activity coming from Canada,” Hutchinson said during a visit to Seattle.

The United States is “adjusting as necessary our border inspections to address those concerns that we have,” Hutchinson said. That means longer lines that slow the flow of commerce between the North American neighbors that share the world’s largest trade relationship, worth more than $1 billion a day.

Zanocco called the safe-injection program a way to help addicts begin rehabilitation. The federal funding of $900,000 requires a government research program on drug use.

Ann Livingston of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users said allowing addicts to inject at supervised sites will reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS and hepatitis, while protecting them from arrest on the streets.

“It is simply a public health initiative to do what’s logical and compassionate and effective,” she said.

About 4,000 addicts live in the 15-square-block Downtown Eastside, which has one of the highest HIV infection rates in the world.

Mayor Larry Campbell, a former police office and coroner, won election last year on a platform that promised safe injection sites as part of a “four pillar” drug policy involving treatment, prevention, harm reduction and enforcement.

Vancouver’s police department was criticized by Human Rights Watch (search ) in April for a crackdown on drug dealers in the area. Police denied targeting users, saying they focused on dealers, but critics said the crackdown would alienate drug users from social services, leading to an increase in disease and death.

Livingston said creating safe-injection sites was a positive step, rather than going soft on drug use. She worries that opponents will create obstacles to its proper establishment.

“We’ll be watching to make sure that it isn’t put forward as a program that’s designed to fail, that it isn’t so restrictive that the people who you want to come in don’t come in,” she said.

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Supreme Court Rejects Bush Medical Marijuana Appeal (Foxnews, 031014)

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected an appeal that jeopardized state medical marijuana laws that allow ill patients to smoke pot if they get a doctor’s recommendation.

Justices turned down the Bush administration’s request to consider whether the federal government can punish doctors for recommending or perhaps even talking about the benefits of the drug to sick patients. An appeals court said they cannot.

Nine states have laws legalizing marijuana for patients with physician recommendations or prescriptions: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Nevada, Oregon and Washington, and 35 states have passed legislation recognizing marijuana’s medicinal value. But federal law bans the use of pot under any circumstances.

The case gave the court an opportunity to review its second medical marijuana case in two years. The last one involved cannabis clubs.

This one presented a more difficult issue, pitting free-speech rights of doctors against government power to keep physicians from encouraging illegal drug use. A ruling for the administration would have made the state medical marijuana laws unusable.

Some California doctors and patients, in filings at the Supreme Court, compared doctor information on pot to physicians’ advice on “red wine to reduce the risk of heart disease, vitamin C, acupuncture, or chicken soup.”

The administration, which has taken a hard stand against the state laws, argued that public health — not the First Amendment free-speech rights of doctors or patients — was at stake.

“The provision of medical advice — whether it be that the patient take aspirin or vitamin C, lose or gain weight, exercise or rest, smoke or refrain from smoking marijuana — is not pure speech. It is the conduct of the practice of medicine. As such, it is subject to reasonable regulation,” Solicitor General Theodore Olson said in court papers.

Some people had expected the Supreme Court to step into the case, which comes from California, the battleground over the subject.

Keith Vines, a prosecutor in San Francisco who used marijuana to overcome HIV-related illnesses, was among those who challenged a policy, put in place during the Clinton administration. That policy requires the revocation of federal prescription licenses of doctors who recommend marijuana.

“If the government is zipping them up, and we’re not being told about options, that’s negligence,” Vines said.

Policy supporters contend that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration must be allowed to protect the public.

The San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that physicians should be able to speak candidly with patients without fear of government sanctions, but they can be punished if they actually help patients obtain the drug.

Doctors fear losing their prescription-writing powers, which would put them out of business.

“It’s taking the culture war issue of the moment and using it in a way that could undermine the First Amendment, medical profession, and patients’ well-being,” said Graham Boyd, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney representing patients, doctors, and other groups.

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Canada Pot Debate Makes U.S. Uneasy (Foxnews, 021023)

CHICAGO — The U.S. government is antsy about a Canadian report that recommends the legalization of marijuana.

The report released by the Canadian Senate last month also suggested that drinking alcohol is far more dangerous than smoking marijuana.

“We have a problem. The problem is much more driven by prohibition and enforcement of the law,” said Canadian Sen. Pierre Nolin of the Progressive Conservative Party.

Nolin is chairman of the Canadian Senate’s Special Committee on illegal drugs.

After studying marijuana use, the committee issued a report last month that concluded that Canadian laws making marijuana use or possession a crime are “ineffective.”

It said that marijuana use poses “very little danger” and recommended that it be legal for Canadians to light up a joint as early as age 16.

“The debate is not finished. It is only the start of the debate,” Nolin said.

The report has drawn sharp criticism from many, including the U.S. government, but has lots of America’s youth flocking north of the border.

The fact that Canada’s drinking age is 19 and Cuban cigars are legal add to the draw.

U.S. officials are already getting their rebuttals in.

“It would create a border security problem for us, an addiction problem for us, a law enforcement problem for us,” John Walters, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, said.

Walters, also known as the nation’s “drug czar,” points out that the United States already has a big problem with Canadian-grown marijuana, especially from western provinces like British Columbia.

“We approximately have 1,400 pounds of B.C. marijuana,” said U.S. Customs official Jacqueline Nolte, of a recent bust. “Normally, we get between 200 and 300 pounds. This is very, very large.”

U.S. Customs agents regularly catch Canadian smugglers trying to bring large amounts of marijuana into the United States.

And while users claim pot is harmless, Walters says the opposite is true.

“More teenagers seek treatment for marijuana dependency than alcohol,” he said.

The U.S.-Canadian border is already porous and as Canada’s largest trading partner, the United States is unlikely to sit on the sidelines while its neighbor to the north weighs whether to make marijuana legal.

Still, Nolin said, the matter isn’t the United States’ decision.

“At the end of the day, the decision will be taken by Canadians for Canadians,” he said.

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This is your sperm cell on drugs (Ottawa Citizen, 040519)

Men who smoke marijuana frequently have significantly less seminal fluid and fewer sperm cells, and those sperm cells they do produce behave like Cheech and Chong, a University at Buffalo study shows.

The result: Less chance of becoming a daddy.

“The bottom line is, the active ingredients in marijuana are doing something to sperm, and the numbers are in the direction toward infertility,” said Lani J. Burkman, a professor of gynecology and lead author on the study.

One possibility is that sperm are losing their natural inhibitions when their owners are stoned. No, no, truly! That’s what she said, a few months back at the American Society of Reproductive Medicine conference:

“THC may be causing improper timing of sperm function by direct stimulation, or it may be bypassing natural inhibition mechanisms. Whatever the cause, the sperm are swimming too fast, too early.” They burn out without reaching an egg cell. (“Hey, man, you wanna swim upstream or just chill here for a while?”)

The tests were done on 22 heavy marijuana smokers. The volunteers reported smoking up to an average of twice a day, and for an average of 5.1 years.

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Canadian pot use doubled in last 13 years: StatsCan (National Post, 040721)

TORONTO — The number of Canadians aged 15 or older who admit to getting high on marijuana or hashish nearly doubled in 13 years, with the highest rates among teenagers, figures released Wednesday by Statistics Canada say.

About three million people in that age group reported that they used cannabis at least once in the year before the Canadian Community Health Survey, which was conducted in 2002.

The StatsCan study also found more people were taking five other drugs: cocaine or crack, ecstasy, LSD and other hallucinogens, amphetamines (speed), and heroin.

Overall, 2.4 per cent of Canadians 15 or older reported using at least one of these drugs in the past year, up from 1.6 per cent in 1994. An estimated 321,000 people, or 1.3 per cent, had used cocaine or crack, making it the most commonly used of these other drugs.

When it came to pot and hashish, 6.5 per cent of Canadians reported using the drugs in 1989 and 7.4 per cent in 1994. By 2002, that proportion had reached 12.2 per cent.

Almost half (47 per cent) of those who had used cannabis in the previous year had done so less than once a month. About 10 per cent reported they had used it on a weekly basis, and another 10 per cent reported smoking up daily.

Men were more likely than women to report having used cannabis in the past year: 15.5 per cent of men compared with 9.1 per cent of women. The proportion of men was higher in all age groups except 15 to 17, where there was no difference between the sexes.

Marijuana and hashish use was most prevalent among young people, and its use peaked in the late teens. Almost four of every 10 teens aged 18 or 19 reported having used marijuana or hashish in the past year. The proportion among 15- to 17-year-olds was about three in 10.

Cannabis use drops off after age 24, although numbers in the 25-34 and 35-44 age groups were still substantial, the report said.

Although most Canadians were not current users of illicit drugs in 2002, more than 10 million reported having tried cannabis at least once in their lifetime. These people represented 41.3 per cent of the population aged 15 or older. Excluding one-time users would drop the proportion to 32 per cent.

Again, men were more likely than women to have tried cannabis at least once. Lifetime use was highest among young adults aged 18 to 24, StatsCan reported.

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Teen Sex and Drug Use Raises Depression Risk (Foxnews, 050920)

Depression may be the result rather than the cause of risky teen behaviors.

A new study shows that teen sex or drug use raised the risk of depression a year later.

Researchers say the results challenge the notion that teens become sexually active or engage in drug use to “self-medicate” their own depression.

“Findings from the study show depression came after substance and sexual activity, not the other way around,” says researcher Denise Dion Hallfors of the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, in a news release.

Sex, Drugs Come First and Depression Follows

In the study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers analyzed data from a national survey of more than 13,000 teenagers in grades seven to 11 who were interviewed in 1995 and again a year later.

Overall, the results showed that sex and drug use was associated with an increased risk of depression by the second interview, but depression didn’t predict risky behavior.

Researchers say both drug experimentation and sexual activity were linked to an increased risk of future depression in teenaged girls. Among teenage boys, only high-risk behaviors, such as binge drinking, were associated with an increase in future depression.

For example:

Girls who had experimented with drugs and sex were two to three times more likely to become depressed than those who abstained. Boys who used marijuana were more than three times as likely to become depressed as nonusers. Boys who engaged in binge drinking were nearly five times more likely to become depressed than abstainers.

Depression Still Raises Risks

Though depression did not influence risky behavior among teenaged boys, researchers found depression was related to behavior in some cases among teenage girls.

Specifically, depression reduced the likelihood of high-risk behavior among girls who abstained from drug and alcohol use but increased the risk of these behaviors among girls already experimenting with drugs and alcohol.

“For females, even modest involvement in substance use and sexual experimentation elevates depression risk,” write the researchers. “In contrast, boys show little added risk with experimental behavior, but binge drinking and frequent use of marijuana contribute substantial risk.”

Researchers say the results show that experimentation with substance use and sex, along with other factors, such as dropping grades in school and social isolation, can be signs of depression in teenagers that parents and health care professionals should look out for.

Identifying Teen Depression

Young people with depression may have a hard time coping with everyday activities and responsibilities, have difficulty getting along with others, and suffer from low self-esteem.

Depression is more than just having the “blues” now and then; it is a persistent condition.

Here are some signs and symptoms of depression to look out for:

—Frequent sadness, tearfulness, or crying

—Hopelessness

—Decreased interest in activities or inability to enjoy former favorite activities

—Persistent boredom; low energy

—Social isolation; poor communication

—Low self-esteem and guilt

—Extreme sensitivity to rejection or failure Increased irritability, anger, or hostility

—Difficulty with relationships Frequent complaints of physical illness such as headaches and stomachaches Frequent absences from school or poor performance in school

—Poor concentration

—A major change in eating and/or sleeping patterns

—Talk of or efforts to run away from home

—Thoughts or expressions of suicide or self-destructive behavior

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Radical Enhancement and the Denial of Human Dignity (Christian Post, 051025)

Should human beings accept certain limitations in terms of cognitive ability and physical strength? These questions take on a whole new urgency in the face of recent developments in the fields of psychostimulants and other pharmaceutical innovations. Moreover, as if these developments do not represent enough of a challenge, the development of computer-enhanced human intelligence may be just around the corner.

Arnold Kling, author of Learning Economics, introduces the issue in a most unusual way: “Perhaps the last unenhanced human to make a significant contribution in the field of mathematics has already been born. In twenty years, the tenure track at top university mathematics departments may consist entirely of people who depend on drugs, direct neural-computer connections, genetic modification, or a combination of all three in order to achieve high-level performance.”

By now, most Americans are aware of the widespread use of anabolic steroids among professional athletes. This scandal threatens to undermine the integrity of baseball as a game. After all, are we really to compare today’s steroid-enhanced homerun hitters with the achievements of Babe Ruth at the Polo Fields?

The use of performance-enhancing pharmaceuticals undermines the integrity of athletic competition. Beyond this, young people are quickly learning the lesson that the use of performance-enhancing drugs is necessary in order to make it in the big leagues, much less to break records. Athletes are growing accustomed to increased demands for urine tests, blood analysis, and other investigative techniques designed to determine just who is and is not using specific performance-enhancing drugs. Meanwhile, few have been watching as the use of psychostimulants is becoming more widespread on the academic side. When it comes to performance-enhancing pharmaceuticals, the nerds are catching up with the jocks.

Kling points to the mathematics department because the use of psychostimulants among some mathematicians has now become public knowledge. As far back as two decades ago, mathematician Paul Erdos was offered five hundred dollars to see if he could kick his use of Benzedrine for just one month. As Joshua Foer reported in Slate magazine, “Erdos met the challenge, but his productivity plummeted so drastically that he decided to go back on the drug.”

Kling reports that an increasing number of college students are using Adderal, a drug commonly prescribed for students diagnosed with attention-deficit disorder. According to Kling, “There are students who have never been diagnosed as having attention deficit who nonetheless claim that the drug improves their concentration. When I asked my college-age daughters if they knew many students who take the drug, they each responded, ‘Of course.’”

“Depressives have Prozac, worrywarts have Valium, gym rats have steroids, and overachievers have Adderal,” quips Foer. Some call Adderal a “cognitive steroid” because it appears to have the same effect on consciousness and alertness that anabolic steroids have on muscle performance. Foer describes Adderal as “a cocktail of amphetamines that increases alertness, concentration, and mental-processing speed and decreases fatigue.” Who doesn’t need a little help in those categories? The diagnosis of attention-deficit syndrome has its own troubled history, but the use of drugs like Ritalin and Adderal has become widespread among the young. Foer cites one study indicating that as many as one in five college students takes either Adderal or Ritalin as “study buddies.”

Experiments with drugs and performance-enhancing chemicals has been a fascination of human beings for a very long time. Just think back to Robert Louis Stevenson’s epic tale, The Strange Tale of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Writers such as James Agee, Graham Greene, and Philip K. Dick, along with poet W. H. Auden used Benzedrine, then available over-the-counter, as a means of speeding up their literary output. Jack Kerouac wrote On the Road in a three-week period after having ingested large amounts of Benzedrine. Existentialist John-Paul Sartre was another Benzedrine devotee.

Now, the use of such drugs—available in updated and more powerful forms—has spread to college students and high schoolers. Educators report that Ritalin and Adderal pills are available for sale on the black market, and kids have been known to give friends pills from their own prescriptions in order to enhance a buddy’s night of cramming for a test.

In an interesting experiment, Joshua Foer decided to take Adderal for a week in order to see just how the drug worked. His report: “The results were miraculous.” His intelligence, memory, cognitive processing speed, and alertness increased so much that Foer felt “like I’d been bitten by a radioactive spider.”

Foer reports that the feeling of being on Adderal shifts from mild euphoria to a calming sensation that lasts for several hours. “When I tried writing on the drug, it was like I had a choir of angels sitting on my shoulders. I became almost mechanical in my ability to pump out sentences,” he remembers. Like any drug, Adderal has side effects, and the experience of coming off the drug can be a disappointment. Nevertheless, many young people are willing to take the risks in order to make the grade, make the team, or break a record.

But Adderal may be just the tip of an iceberg. Arnold Kling points to the emergence of neural implants which may be able to make direct connections between the human brain and technological devices. “Today, if I want to look up information, I have to get to a computer, connect it to a web site, and type in a search phrase,” Kling observes. “In the future, perhaps I will have an implant in my ear that can handle communication between my brain and the Internet, so I will not need the computer or its keyboard. Alternatively, my implant will communicate with a sort of mega-iPod, small in size but large in storage capacity, that can access and process all sorts of data.”

Beyond this, genetic modification will be another path for temptation. “Perhaps scientists can find a way to modify genes in enough of my brain cells to improve my memory or other cognitive skills,” Kling observes. “If not, then they are likely to develop the ability to enable parents to determine genetic characteristics of children. If nothing else, they will be able to give parents of babies fertilized in vitro the ability to select based on genetic characteristics.”

Scientists working on cures for Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s, and other brain diseases are pushing the limits, even as new drugs and therapies promise progress in treating those dreaded diseases. At the same time, however, those same drugs are likely to be used for other purposes.

There is something seriously wrong with a society that worships achievement and enhancement at the expense of human dignity. Just last week the New York Times reported that the use of sleeping pills among children and very young adults rose 85% from 2000 to 2004—with much of that rise attributed to alleviating the effects of taking psychostimulants as prescribed by doctors. When children have to take sleeping pills in order to counter the effects of psychostimulants, something has gone horribly wrong. When athletes, even at younger and younger ages, put their health at risk by taking anabolic steroids just in order to make the team and win on the athletic field, something perverse is at work. When the students over in the mathematics department are hopping themselves up on Adderal in order to make higher grades (or get hired as professors), human intelligence is redefined with unknown effects.

All this runs counter to a biblical understanding of humanity. According to the Bible, human beings are inherently finite. All humans bear the image of God, and this sets humanity apart from all other creatures. Nevertheless, the Bible warns that human over-reaching is, at least in one sense, the very essence of sin itself. This was true of Adam and Eve in the garden when they ate the forbidden fruit, and it was the driving energy behind the organizers of Babel, who wanted to make a name for themselves.

There are limits to human intelligence, and a Christian view of humanity cannot encourage the use of artificial means in order to transcend human limitations.

Undoubtedly, there is a fine line between efforts to achieve health, and ambition to transcend natural human limitations.

Now is the time for serious-minded Christians to give attention to these questions and to confront these present and future challenges with mature Christian reflection and genuine biblical engagement. We bear responsibility to think about these issues before the Brave New World of human enhancement arrives in its more radical forms. Otherwise, the needed debate will come too late.

_______________________________________________

R. Albert Mohler, Jr. is president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.

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Teen Drug Use Dips, Drinking Unchanged (Christian Post, 060407)

WASHINGTON (AP) - Drug use among teens has dipped nationwide but underage drinking persists, with jumps in California and Wisconsin, according to a study released Thursday.

The report by the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, based on interviews of 135,500 people, is the first to document state-by-state drug and alcohol use from 2002 to 2004.

It found that in 2004, 10.9% of young people age 12 to 17 reported that they had used an illegal drug in the past month, a drop from 11.4% in 2002.

Fueling the decline were six states — Illinois, Nebraska, North Carolina, South Dakota, Vermont and Virginia — while use in other states was largely flat.

At the same time, teen alcohol use remained basically unchanged — from 17.67% in 2002 to 17.65% in 2004. Among the youths age 12 to 20, California drinkers rose from 24.7% to 26.3%, while Wisconsin increased from 34.7% to 38.3%.

“While we are making progress on drug and alcohol use among youth, underage drinking continues as a stubbornly persistent problem,” said Charles Curie, administrator of SAMHSA. “It’s time to change attitudes toward teen drinking from acceptance to abstinence.”

“It begins by recognizing the importance of parents talking to their children early and often about alcohol, especially before they’ve started drinking,” he said.

The report showed wide disparities from state to state when it came to tobacco use as well as abuse of alcohol and drugs, including cocaine, marijuana and the non-medical use of pain relievers.

Alaska and New Mexico topped the list among those ages 12 and older who reported using an illegal drug in the past month, at 11.8% and 11.3%, respectively, compared to a national average of 8.1%. The most drug-free were Mississippi (5.8%) and Iowa (6.5%).

Among teens, tobacco-producing state Kentucky as well as South Dakota had the most tobacco use at 24.3% and 21.3%, respectively, compared to a national average of 14.4%. The lowest were Utah (8.7%) and the District of Columbia (9%).

Other findings:

• West Virginia had the highest rate of self-reported “serious psychological distress” among adults age 18 and older in the past year (12.7%), while Hawaii had the lowest (7.1%). The study did not track distress among youth.

• Ten states registered gains: Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas, West Virginia and Wyoming.

• Eight states ranked in the top fifth for underage use of alcohol as well as underage binge use: Iowa, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Douglas Wright of SAMHSA, who authored the study, said the results show that states need to review their individual findings carefully so they can tailor anti-drug and alcohol efforts accordingly. In general, colder, more rural states in the north may need to be particularly vigilant, he said.

“States tend to have drinking and other problems as you go further north, where a large portion of the year you are removed from a lot of other people,” Wright said.

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Afghanistan opium cultivation skyrockets (World, 060903)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghanistan’s world-leading opium cultivation rose a “staggering” 59% this year, the U.N. anti-drugs chief announced Saturday in urging the government to crack down on big traffickers and remove corrupt officials and police.

The record crop yielded 6,100 tons of opium, or enough to make 610 tons of heroin - outstripping the demand of the world’s heroin users by a third, according to U.N. figures.

Officials warned that the illicit trade is undermining the Afghan government, which is under attack by Islamic militants that a U.S.-led offensive helped drive from power in late 2001 for harboring Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida bases.

“The news is very bad. On the opium front today in some of the provinces of Afghanistan, we face a state of emergency,” Antonio Maria Costa, chief of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, said at a news conference. “In the southern provinces, the situation is out of control.”

He talked with reporters after presenting results of the U.N. survey to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who voiced “disappointment” over the figures. “Our efforts to fight narcotics have proved inadequate,” Karzai said in a statement.

With the economy struggling, there are not enough jobs and many Afghans say they have to grow opium poppies to feed their families. The trade already accounts for at least 35% of Afghanistan’s economy, financing warlords and insurgents.

The top U.S. narcotics official here said the opium trade is a threat to the country’s fledgling democracy.

“This country could be taken down by this whole drugs problem,” Doug Wankel told reporters. “We have seen what can come from Afghanistan, if you go back to 9/11. Obviously the U.S. does not want to see that again.”

The bulk of the opium increase was in lawless Helmand province, where cultivation rose 162% and accounted for 42% of the Afghan crop. The province has been wracked by the surge in attacks by Taliban-led militants that has produced the worst fighting in five years.

Opium-growing increased despite the injection of hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid to fight the drug over the past two years. Costa criticized the international effort and said foreign aid was “plagued by huge overhead costs” in its administration.

Costa said Afghanistan’s insecurity is fueling the opium boom, saying he has pleaded with the NATO force that took over military operations in the south a month ago to take a “stronger role” in fighting drugs. NATO says it has no mandate for direct involvement in the anti-drug campaign.

“We need much stronger, forceful measures to improve security or otherwise I’m afraid we are going to face a dramatic situation of failed regions, districts and even perhaps even provinces in the near future,” Costa said.

The U.N. report, based on satellite imagery and ground surveys, said the area under poppy cultivation in Afghanistan reached 407,700 acres in 2006, up 59% from 257,000 acres in 2005. The previous high was 323,700 acres in 2004.

The estimated yield of 6,100 tons of opium resin - described by Costa as “staggering” - is up 49% from 4,100 tons last year, and exceeds the previous high for total global output of 5,764 tons recorded in 1999.

Last year, about 450 tons of heroin was consumed worldwide, 90% of it from Afghanistan, according to the U.N.

The report will increase pressure on the beleaguered Afghan president. Karzai has often talked tough on drugs, even declaring a “holy war” against the trade, but he is increasingly criticized for appointing and failing to sack corrupt provincial governors and police.

Costa urged the arrest of “serious drug traffickers” to fill a new high-security wing for narcotics convicts at Kabul’s Policharki prison. “It has 100 beds. We want these beds to be taken up in the next few months,” he said.

At the same news conference, the Afghan counternarcotics minister, Habibullah Qaderi, said the government had the will to make arrests, but lacked the capacity to gather evidence to prosecute “the big fish.”

Yet he maintained that with its newly unveiled national anti-drugs strategy, Afghanistan could “control” drug production within five years.

Costa was less upbeat. “It’s going to take possibly 20 years to get rid of the problem,” he said, citing the experience of former opium producers like Thailand, Turkey and Pakistan.

In an indication of the alarming extent of official complicity in the trade, a Western counternarcotics official said about 25,000 to 30,000 acres of government land in Helmand was used to cultivate opium poppies this year.

The official, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said police and government officials are involved in cultivating poppies, providing protection for growers or taking bribes to ensure the crops aren’t destroyed.

He said the Taliban - which managed to nearly eradicate Afghanistan’s poppy crop in 2001, just before their ouster for giving refuge to Osama bin Laden - now profit from the trade.

In some instances, drug traffickers have provided vehicles and money to the Taliban to carry out terrorist attacks, he said. But added that the ties seem to be local and that there is no evidence of coordination between drug lords and the Taliban leadership.

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Teens’ use of illegal drugs drops (Washington Times, 061222)

Teenagers’ use of illegal drugs has declined significantly in the past five years, a new government study shows, although the study found a slight increase in teens abusing prescription painkillers and other legally available substances.

Comparing data from 2001 and 2006, the federal study found the number of teens who reported using marijuana within the past 30 days fell 25%, while past 30-day use of methamphetamine plunged 50% during the same five-year period.

Teen use of cigarettes, alcohol, steroids, cocaine, heroin and LSD were also down, in some cases dramatically, the report from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) found. Underage drinking is down more than a third since it peaked a decade ago. Past-month teen smoking is at an all-time low, with the biggest declines among 12th-graders.

The 32nd annual NIDA “Monitoring the Future” survey, conducted by the University of Michigan, found that 840,000 fewer adolescents used illicit drugs in 2006 than in 2001. The 23-percent decline in past 30-day usage nearly reached President Bush’s goal of reducing teens’ illicit-drug use by 25% during that time period.

However, officials said they were concerned by other findings in this year’s report — based on a survey of nearly 50,000 eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders from 410 public and private schools — which marked the first time “Monitoring the Future” examined the frequency of teens using over-the-counter (OTC) cough-and-cold medicines to get high.

Dr. Elias A. Zerhouni, director of the National Institutes of Health, of which NIDA is a part, said the report showed that 4.2% of eighth-graders, 5.3% of 10th-graders and 6.9% of 12th-graders reported such misuse of nonprescription cough-and-cold medicines containing dextromethorphan (DXM), a cough suppressant, during the past 12 months. DXM — known by the slang term “dex” or “skittles” — is generally safe when taken at recommended levels. But it can cause harmful side effects, such as alterations of consciousness or mood, if taken in large amounts, health officials say.

Coupled with that, the report showed increased teen abuse of prescription painkillers, Vicodin and Oxycontin, and of stimulants including Ritalin, which is commonly prescribed for those suffering attention-deficit disorders.

Authors of the study expressed “significant concern” over the Vicodin data. Use of that drug by teens rose 0.3% between 2002 and 2006 and 0.6% just from last year. Vicodin use remained high in all three grade levels, with nearly one in 10 high-school seniors saying they had taken it in the past year.

Oxycontin use by high-school seniors dipped between 2005 and 2006 but not for students in younger grades, the report showed.

University of Michigan researcher Lloyd Johnston, lead investigator in the study, told reporters at a press conference yesterday that annual prevalence of Oxycontin use by 12th-graders averaged 4.3% this year, down from 5.5% in 2005. But the 2.6% annual prevalence by eighth-graders and the 3.6% prevalence by sophomores were the highest ever. Use among eighth-graders seems to be increasing rapidly.

“Obviously, relatively few young people are using Oxycontin; still, given the addictive potential of this strong narcotic drug, I think we should be concerned about these rates,” Mr. Johnston said.

He added: “Because most of the illegal drugs like LSD, Ecstasy, cocaine and heroin have shown considerable declines in recent years, while the misuse of prescription drugs has been growing, the latter have become a more important part of the country’s drug problems.”

Although use of marijuana also has been declining, it remains the most widely used of all illegal drugs, Mr. Johnston said.

He and others also expressed concern that eighth-graders two years in a row have shown a decreased perception of the harmfulness of Ecstasy. He said too many teens also fail to recognize the dangers posed by DXM in cough medicines.

“The survey results indicate that the messages we are sending to students about addiction and drug abuse are having an overall positive effect,” said Dr. Zerhouni. But he called the “rise in prescription-drug use among the younger grades and the intentional abuse of over-the-counter medicines ... very disturbing.”

John Walters, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, urged parents to help the Bush administration’s campaign against teen drug abuse by discarding unused and unneeded drugs from their home medicine cabinets.

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Dutch Health Ministry Extends Medical Marijuana Program for 5 Years (Foxnews, 071107)

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands — The Dutch Health Ministry announced plans Wednesday to extend its experimental medical marijuana program for five years, despite setbacks.

Under the program, launched in 2003, standardized marijuana is grown by a government-licensed grower under controlled conditions and sold by prescription in pharmacies.

But few patients, even armed with a doctor’s prescription, bought the regulated weed since they could buy it at a third of the price in “coffee shops,” where it remains illegal but tolerated if sold in small amounts.

The medical marijuana plan was meant to allow the licensed grower, BMC, to build a customer base and eventually take over production from illegal growers. It also would give companies a chance to develop and register cannabis-based prescription drugs.

Health Minister Ab Klink said in a letter to parliament Wednesday that companies had made progress in drug development, and he wanted to give them more time to succeed.

“This development track will take years, but it can yield scientific evidence and give insight into the balance between safety and effectiveness of medical cannabis,” he wrote.

“By making medical marijuana available as a raw material for five years, I want to give this track a serious chance.”

Klink conceded BMC would have a surplus this year, and said he hoped a drug under development would eventually replace marijuana and the need for official growers.

The centrist government agreed as part of its coalition pact not to change country’s famed tolerance policy on unregulated marijuana, which is rife with contradictions.

Advocates say full legalization would lead to better labeling of the plant’s chemical contents.

And while coffee shops openly sell marijuana and hash, they have no way to legally source their products. Many are supplied by mini-plantations hidden in residential areas, causing a fire hazard. Police are called in to dismantle them on a daily basis.

Amsterdam benefits from tourists who come to smoke marijuana, but the city’s emergency services are taxed by smokers who experience panic attacks after trying unexpectedly strong weed.

Border towns suffer problems from “drug tourists” who travel from neighboring Germany and Belgium and nearby France to stock up on weed.

Under the previous conservative government, parliament was dissuaded from outright legalization by fears that it would lead to a confrontation with the European Union.

According to data compiled by the Netherlands’ Trimbos Institute for Mental Health and Addiction, after 30 years of the Dutch tolerance policy, usage rates here are somewhere in the middle of international norms — above those in Germany and the Scandinavian countries, but below those of France, Britain and the United States.

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Many of Amsterdam’s Brothels, Marijuana Cafes to Close (Foxnews, 081206)

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands — Amsterdam unveiled plans Saturday to shutter up to half of its famed brothels and marijuana cafes as part of a major cleanup of its ancient city center.

The city says it wants to drive organized crime out of the neighborhood, and is targeting businesses that “generate criminality,” including prostitution, gambling parlors, “smart shops” that sell herbal treatments, head shops and “coffee shops” where marijuana is sold openly.

“By reduction and zoning of these kinds of functions, we will be able to manage better and tackle the criminal infrastructure,” the city said in a statement.

It said it would also reduce a number of business it sees as related to the “decay” of the center, including peep shows, sex shows, sex shops, mini supermarkets, massage parlors and souvenir shops.

The city said there were too many of these and it believes some are used for money-laundering by drug dealers and the human traffickers who supply many of the city’s prostitutes.

Under the plan announced Saturday, Amsterdam will spend $38-$51 million to bring hotels, restaurants, cultural organizations and boutiques to the center. It will also build new underground parking areas for cars and bikes and may use some of the vacated buildings to ease a housing shortage.

Amsterdam already had plans to close many brothels and said last month it might close some coffee shops throughout the city, but the plans announced Saturday go much further.

The city said it would offer retraining to prostitutes and coffee shop employees who will lose their jobs as a result of the plan.

Prostitution, which has spread into several areas of the center, will be allowed only in two areas — notably De Wallen (“The Walls”), a web of streets and alleys around the city’s medieval retaining dam walls. The area has been a center of prostitution since before the city’s golden shipping age in the 1600s.

Prostitution was legalized in the Netherlands in 2000, formalizing a long-standing tolerance policy.

Marijuana is technically illegal in the Netherlands, but prosecutors won’t press charges for possession of small amounts and the coffee shops are able to sell it openly.

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Michael Phelps pulled from from Calgary speaking engagement (National Post, 090224)

A Calgary Olympian said she was surprised to learn Michael Phelps won’t be appearing at a scheduled speaking engagement in the city.

“It’s too bad he’s not coming to Calgary,” said Erica Morningstar, 19, a medal hopeful in the pool for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London. “He’s one of the world’s greatest athletes and I think it would’ve been interesting to hear what he has to say.”

The Power Within, a Toronto-based promoter that organized an motivational speaking event for March 3 at the Telus Convention Centre, has yanked the American swimming champion.

“Due to the widely publicized alleged use of marijuana by Michael Phelps, the decision has been made to present the program without Mr. Phelps’ participation,” Power Within said in a released statement.

Calls to the company for comment were not returned, but a call taker at Power Within confirmed actor Martin Sheen has been added as a replacement for Phelps and tickets for the $229 event are not refundable.

Phelps has also been removed from the company’s website for a March 6 event scheduled for Vancouver with Oprah Winfrey regular Dr. Mehmet Oz.

For Morningstar, the photos released showing Phelps apparently smoking marijuana from a bong are evidence of a “stupid decision” but don’t take away from the fact he won a record eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympics last summer.

“It doesn’t tarnish what he accomplished in Beijing,” said Morningstar a Canadian record holder who competed at the 2008 Summer Games.

Phelps has apologized for his behaviour captured in the photos taken at a party in November. He has subsequently been suspended for three months by USA Swimming as a reprimand and has lost his endorsement deal with Kellogg Co.

Young elite athletes such as Morningstar are given media training intended to make them aware of who’s taking photos of them and what they should and shouldn’t post online at Internet sites such as Facebook.

Olympic gold medal hockey player Cassie Campbell says she’s still wary of having her photo taken in public.

“I don’t smoke marijuana, but even if I’m out with a friend having a beer or a glass of wine I have to be careful,” said Campbell, now a television personality and hockey commentator. “If I see someone coming to take a photo, I make sure the glass isn’t around because it may be the only beer I drink all night, but once the photo gets online who knows what will start being said about it.

“When we’re talking about Michael Phelps, an Olympic athlete should not be smoking pot. It’s not like this is a photo of him with a beer in his hand or even a joint. He was inhaling from a bong, that’s whole new level of smoking pot.”

Campbell said successful elite athletes are role models for kids and Phelps will have to accept the consequences for his actions.

After an investigation into the incident, the sheriff in the county in South Carolina where the party took place has said Phelps will not be charged as a result of any activity depicted in the published photos.

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New Jersey Becomes 14th State To Allow Medical Marijuana Use (Foxnews, 100118)

[KH: creating problems for the new governor in the last minute]

TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine signed legislation granting chronically ill patients legal access to marijuana on Monday, one of dozens of bills inked by the governor on his last full day in office.

The governor signed the bill after hours Monday, making New Jersey the 14th state to allow patients with diseases such as cancer, AIDS, glaucoma and multiple sclerosis to use marijuana to alleviate their pain, nausea and other symptoms.

“New Jersey will soon no longer make criminals out of our very sick and terminally ill,” said Assembly co-sponsor Reed Gusciora.

The legislation allows for dispensaries to be set up around the state where patients with prescriptions can access the drug. The state Health Department will license and monitor the dispensaries.

Growing marijuana at home and driving after using the drug remain illegal under the new law. Gusciora, a Democrat, said New Jersey’s medical marijuana law is the strictest in the country and will serve as a model for other states.

Assembly co-sponsor Joan Voss called the law “a moral and commonsense approach” to debilitating illnesses. She said marijuana has been shown to alleviate pain and suffering when other drugs can’t.

Other states that have already removed criminal penalties for medical marijuana are: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

The bill is one of 55 Corzine signed while working privately in Newark on Monday. Gov.-elect Chris Christie will be sworn in Tuesday.

Earlier, Corzine signed a measure ending state control of the City of Camden after eight years. The state has been overseeing financial affairs of the impoverished city since pumping tens of millions of dollars into a bailout in 2002. The law returns control of the city’s day-to-day operations to the newly elected mayor, former state Sen. Dana Redd. The state will retain some oversight.

Corzine said Camden city government has regained the public’s trust and is again able to deliver essential municipal services. The legislation abolished the chief operating officer position. Corzine also signed legislation requiring restaurant chains to list calorie counts of selections sold on their menus, increasing transit funding for senior citizens and the disabled, requiring the public reporting of infection rates at surgical centers, and extending until March 16 the date his successor must deliver his 2011 budget address.

A package of bills providing educational, addiction and jobs training services to inmates before they leave prison was signed despite Christie’s promise to veto any new laws requiring additional spending. New Jersey faces a budget deficit of at least $8 billion for the fiscal year that begins in July.

The bills Corzine signed Monday run the gamut of concerns, from requiring continuing education for licensed professional engineers to denying abusive spouses the right to determine how their partner’s remains are disposed of.

The law mandating calorie counts affects restaurant chains with more than 20 locations nationally, and, according to the governor, is an essential ingredient for people seeking healthier lifestyles.

“One of the best ways to improve our health and well being is to deal directly with obesity and proper eating,” Corzine said in a statement. “This legislation is a clear step in that direction, as it will allow New Jerseyans to know the calorie content of the food they are eating at these establishments.”

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AP-CNBC Poll: Most in US against legalizing pot (Foxnews, 100420)

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Most Americans still oppose legalizing marijuana but larger majorities believe pot has medical benefits and the government should allow its use for that purpose, according to an Associated Press-CNBC poll released Tuesday.

Respondents were skeptical that crime would spike if marijuana is decriminalized or that it would lead more people to harder drugs like heroin or cocaine. There also was a nearly even split on whether government spends too much or the right amount enforcing marijuana laws. Almost no one thinks too little is spent.

Marijuana use — medically and recreationally — is getting more attention in the political arena. California voters will decide in November whether to legalize the drug, and South Dakota will vote this fall on whether to allow medical uses. California and 13 other states already permit such use.

The balloting comes against the backdrop of the Obama administration saying it won’t target marijuana dispensaries if they comply with state laws, a departure from the policy of the Bush administration, which sought to more stringently enforce the federal ban on marijuana use for any purpose.

In the poll, only 33% favor legalization while 55% oppose it. People under 30 were the only age group favoring legalization (54%) and opposition increased with age, topping out at 73% of those 65 and older. Opposition also was prevalent among women, Republicans and those in rural and suburban areas.

Some opponents worried legalization would lead to reefer madness.

“I think it would be chaos if it was legalized,” said Shirley Williams, a 75-year-old retired English teacher from Quincy, Ill. “People would get in trouble and use marijuana as an excuse.”

Those like Jeff Boggs, 25, of Visalia, Calif., who support legalization said the dangers associated with the drug have been overstated.

“People are scared about things they don’t know about,” said Boggs, who is married and works for an auto damage appraisal company.

Americans are more accepting of medical marijuana. Sixty percent support the idea and 74% believe the drug has a real medical benefit for some people. Two-thirds of Democrats favor medical marijuana as do a slim majority of Republicans, 53%.

Peoples’ views on legalizing marijuana or on allowing its use for medicinal purposes were largely uniform across different regions of the country, despite the fact that legal medical marijuana use is concentrated in the West.

Bill Hankins, 77, of Mason, Mich., opposes legalizing marijuana but strongly favors using the drug medicinally. Michigan is among the states that allow medical pot.

“It has been shown through tests to alleviate pain in certain medical conditions,” said Hankins, who said he experimented with pot when he was younger. If Hankins fell gravely ill and “my doctor said I should have it to control the pain, I would use it,” he said.

California was the first state to approve medical marijuana, in 1996, and has been the hub of the so-called “Green Rush” to legalize marijuana. But a patchwork of local laws in the state has created confusion about the law and lax oversight led to an explosion of medical marijuana dispensaries in some places.

In Los Angeles, the number of dispensaries exploded from four to upward of 1,000 in the past five years. Police believe some were nothing but fronts for drug dealers to sell marijuana to people who have no medical need, and the city recently adopted an ordinance to reduce that number to 70 in coming months.

Among those surveyed, 45% said the cost of enforcing existing laws is too high and 48% said it’s about right. Democrats, men and young people were most apt to say the cost is exorbitant.

With state and local governments desperate for cash, some legalization proponents are pushing marijuana as a potential revenue stream. But only 14% of those surveyed who oppose legalization would change their mind if states were to tax the drug.

John Lovell, a spokesman with the California Narcotics Officers’ Association, said he wasn’t surprised by the poll results because people already are aware of widespread abuse of legal prescription drugs and alcohol.

“Given that reality, we don’t need to add another mind-altering substance that compromises people’s five senses,” Lovell said.

Allen St. Pierre, executive director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said that, since the organization was formed in 1970, there’s been a slow but steady erosion of opposition to marijuana.

“Every single metric is pushing toward a zeitgeist in marijuana reform,” he said.

Ann Broadus, 58, of Petros, Tenn., strongly opposes legalization and medicinal use, but even she sees the day when the laws will change.

“Probably somewhere down the road it will be legalized, but I hope not,” she said. “I think if it becomes legal, these druggies would be worse off.”

The AP-CNBC Poll was conducted April 7-12, 2010, by GfK Roper Public Affairs and Media. It involved interviews with 1,001 adults nationwide on landline and cellular telephones. It had a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4.3%age points.

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Cyclist Landis Admits Doping, Alleges Use by Others (Foxnews, 100520)

Floyd Landis, the American cyclist whose 2006 Tour De France victory was nullified after a positive doping test, has sent a series of emails to cycling officials and sponsors admitting to, and detailing, his systematic use of performance enhancing drugs during his career. The emails also claim that other riders and cycling officials allegedly participated in doping, including seven-time Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong.

It’s unclear how many emails Mr. Landis sent. Three emails, which are dated between April 30 and May 6, have been reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. Mr. Landis copied seven people on these three emails, including officials with USA Cycling and the International Cycling Union. Three people who have seen the emails and spoken to Mr. Landis about them say they are authentic.

Mr. Armstrong did not respond to messages seeking comment Wednesday evening. Mr. Armstrong has faced a number of doping accusations during his career, which he has denied. He has never been sanctioned.

Mr. Landis’s charges couldn’t be independently verified. Mr. Landis did not respond to a request for comment.

In the emails, he expressed frustration about the inability of antidoping officials to clean up the sport.

After the Tour De France stripped Mr. Landis of his 2006 victory for testing positive for elevated levels of testosterone after one crucial stage of the race, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency gave him a two-year ban from the sport. From the moment the positive test was revealed, Mr. Landis has denied publicly ever using performance enhancing drugs.

The emails are particularly focused on American riders. Mr. Landis said in them that during his career, he and other American riders learned how to conduct blood transfusions, take the synthetic blood booster Erythropoietin, or EPO, and use steroids. Mr. Landis said he started using testosterone patches, then progressed to blood transfusions, EPO, and a liquid steroid taken orally.

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Marijuana, Accutane, and the Suspension of Science By the Cultural Left (townhall.com, 100708)

Hugh Hewitt

On November 2 California voters will chose a new governor and hopefully a new United States Senator.

Meg Whitman, the former head of eBay leads current Attorney General and former governor Jerry Brown in the race to succeed Arnold.

And Carly Fiorina is within three points of the United States Senate’s dimmest bulb, Barbara Boxer, whose embarrassing 18 year run of incompetence and irrelevance may at last be coming to a merciful end.

These two contests will dominate most of the headlines out of the Golden State over the next four months —except for those concerning the state’s fiscal meltdown.

But there will be one other enormously important contest on California’s November 2 ballot —Proposition 19, which would legalize marijuana use in the state.

If passed, Proposition 19 will allow adults 21 years and older to possess, cultivate, or transport cannabis for personal use, and will permit local governments to regulate and tax commercial production and sale of cannabis to adults 21 years and older. President Obama who was quick to authorize a law suit against Arizona on that state’s immigration law hasn’t said whether he will direct the Department of Justice to challenge Proposition 19 if it passes, but given the hyper-partisan record of Eric Holder, don’t expect the DOJ to challenge a cultural breakthrough for the left.

Anyone with a bookmark to Google can quickly access the studies that detail the known long term and serious side-effects of chronic marijuana use. What is really interesting is what we don’t know about the drug and its impacts on health and whether voters will throw that caution born of our ignorance to the wind.

Which brings me to Accutane.

After reading a story on air about the long term side effects of Accutane on some users —effects which include irritable bowel syndrome as well as even more acute diseases such as Crohn’s disease and which may also include an array of other disabilities including depression— a number of listeners emailed for guidance on how to proceed if they had taken Accutane and suffered from such a serious condition.

I dug into the subject and along with one of my law partners interviewed two of the leading mass tort lawyers who specialize in the area and learned not only about the extent of litigation emerging on Accutane but also on claims brought in a number of other areas against a number of other drug manufacturers including, for example, claims brought by women who had used anti-depressants during pregnancy who had given birth to children with birth defects.

Time and again the long-term consequences of drug use turn out to be unanticipated and harmful.

This isn’t an argument against rapid FDA evaluation of new treatments and compounds. Promising treatments for disabling or deadly conditions need to move forward to market quickly and to allow for individuals to make choices about the risks they are willing to run.

But rarely do we rush forward to make widely available a powerful drug for recreational use.

As this conversation among the lawyers proceeded I was thinking of Prop 19 and its low profile in the media as well as remarkably high approval rates among young voters who see in dope nothing more than another form of recreation very much akin to alcohol.

Young people are not particularly good evaluators of risk, and they are certainly not careful analysts of trade-offs that are more speculative than concrete.

But ask a young person if he or she would take Accutane now for even a severe case of acne against the backdrop of the suspected side-effects in all their unpleasant detail? Chances are they wouldn’t make that trade-off because the information on which they are evaluating the choice is far more complete than it was even ten years ago.

Would a young voter draw the connection between the Accutane choice and the Prop 19 choice? Will they be willing to be persuaded that the information gap around the latter issue parallels the gap that existed around Accutane a decade ago and vote accordingly?

Not likely, because increasingly the electorate has lost its ability to evaluate risk.

The left is willing to launch a world wide economic revolution based on speculations about the impacts of a yet unknown global temperature change.

And the left is willing to set aside the known impacts of increases in marginal rates of taxation on income and investment in order to serve political agendas that demand punishment of the successful.

And now the left —especially the left within the MSM— is willing to ignore the enormous data gap concerning marijuana because its agenda long ago identified with dope.

Because the left has systematically abused the idea of risk for so long it is an almost impossible concept to employ effectively in a down ballot issue like Prop 19.

If Prop 19 passes and the president decides not to order the DOJ to move against it, then we will eventually get the data on dope use that has long eluded the public because of the inability to easily study the consequences of illegal behavior. What we discover will almost certainly be bad news. What a shame it will turn out to be that the issue wasn’t judged worthy of sustained debate in 2010.

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