BUSTING CANNABIS MYTHS AND GETTING REAL ABOUT THE BENEFITS
For nearly 100 years, there has been tremendous undue stigma toward cannabis in this country. Governmental entities (both federal and state) and policy groups (D.A.R.E., AALM, etc.) have long stressed this plant as a 'gateway drug' and one very dangerous to the fabric of American society. These groups did not consider the plant to be of any significant medical use either.
Beginning in 1913, states began to outright ban cannabis within their borders. In 1931, Texas made possession of marijuana a crime punishable by up to a life sentence. This trend of criminalization and prohibition came on the heels of the misguided and fundamentally repealed prohibition of alcohol which began in 1920 and ended in 1933. In 1970, the federal Controlled Substances Act enshrined marijuana as a "Schedule I" drug, the most extreme category, deeming it had a high potential for abuse and no legitimate medical uses. This tier includes drugs like GHB and heroin. For context, the second tier includes cocaine, morphine, fentanyl, and methamphetamines. Marijuana, amazingly, remains a Schedule I drug to this very day.
Research since 1970 has proven that cannabis is not in fact a "gateway drug" and that its moderate use has not been shown to lead directly to the use of harder drugs. People predisposed to addiction certainly have a higher risk for addiction to both hard drugs and marijuana but the link allegedly driving cannabis users toward cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines, and others has been shown to be false. Moreover, there is a bevy of new findings suggesting that the legalization and decriminalization of cannabis in states has led to decreased opioid use rates, decreased opioid overdose deaths, and even decreased incidence of drunk driving arrests. A study published by the National Institutes of Health utilizing data from nearly 5 million people found that "...marijuana legalization was associated with lower odds of opioid use, chronic opioid use, and high-risk opioid use when controlling for many state-level and patient-level factors... These results suggest that medical marijuana legalization could be one policy tool that may modestly decrease opioid use; chronic and high-risk opioid use in a landscape where pain management options are limited and opioid misuse and addiction are rising rapidly."
In addition to pain management, cannabis has been shown to have a multitude of other beneficial medicinal effects from suppressing nausea and vomiting, to the treatment of epilepsy, migraines, menstrual pain, and more. That doesn't include the possible therapeutic benefits for those suffering from conditions ranging from depression, to anxiety, to PTSD. We will delve into the benefits of cannabis (both medicinal and therapeutic) in a subsequent article. Cannabis has a long history of use in religious and cultural ceremonies dating back thousands of years as well.
Needless to say that the federal government, state governments, and drug policy advocates need to get better acquainted with contemporary peer-reviewed scientific cannabis research. The negative stigma surrounding this plant has been informed by decades of fear-mongering and pseudo-scientific theories. Demystification is happening and must continue to progress. The good it can do within communities goes beyond job creation and capital investment. It can affect rates of hard drug use, the lives of legal-age consumers who utilize it in moderation both medicinally and therapeutically, and black and brown communities who have lived under the yoke of oppressive drug policies stemming from these outdated stigmas.