Friday, May 16, 2008

Cannabis Link to Heart Attack/Stroke Full of Flaws

It's all over the online press; 'Marijuana Use Linked to Heart Attack/Stroke' - 'Cannabis Could Cause Stroke'. On the face of it, and according to the summaries and interviews that have flooded the web in the past few days, it appears cannabis users are all doomed to die of heart disease.

If you haven't seen the headlines, I'll give you a sample to check out:

'Marijuana Use May Raise Risk of Heart Attack/Stroke' -
US News and Global Report

'Study Finds Possible Connection Between Marijuana Abuse And Stroke or Heart Attacks' -
Armenian Medical Network

'Marijuana May up Heart Attack/Stroke Risk: Study' -
Yahoo Health News

But then, someone smells a rat and digs a little deeper to find that there is something strange going on. Russ Belville, podcaster over at NORML, checked the figures and discovered exactly how misleading the mainstream media must be. You can read the above link to the blog, or check the NORML blog with much the same but prettier coding.


A U.S. group supporting legal sales and regulation of marijuana disputed the findings. Marijuana Policy Project spokesman Bruce Mirken said, for example, the study involved people who were extremely heavy users.

“I think the low end was 78 joints a week. That’s 10 or 11 joints a day,” Mirken said in a telephone interview.

“We’re talking about people who are stoned all the time. We’re talking about the marijuana equivalent of the guy in the alley clutching a bottle of cheap wine. If you do anything to that level of excess, it might well have some untoward effects, whether it’s marijuana or wine or broccoli,” Mirken added.

“Even if you take this finding at face value, it’s not at all clear that it has any relevance to the real world because there is still no data showing higher rates of mortality among marijuana smokers. If this was a significant cause of cardiovascular disease, where are the bodies?”


So instead of us smokers being the next wave of dead people, we're just being mislead with extreme science.
Russ Belville sorts the figures:

Mirken’s right. 78 to 350 joints a week? That’s 11 to 50 joints per day. Let’s see, the government-rolled joints weigh in at about ¾ gram each (you do know there are official US Federal Government joints, right?), but the folks I know roll them a bit bigger (even to the ridiculous cubit-sized 70-gram models). However, most researchers seem happy with the ¾ gram model, so let’s do the math:

Low-end = 11 joints/day = 11 x 0.75g = 8.25g/day = about 2 ounces / week
High-end = 50 joints/day = 50 x 0.75g = 37.5g/day = over 9 ounces / week

So if you are consuming daily enough cannabis to equal about one-half to two-and-one-half pounds per month, then you might run an increased risk of stroke, heart attack, and heart disease. Personally, I’m thinking that at $300 per ounce, you’re more likely to run the risk of bankruptcy!

Yet still, note that the study doesn’t check to see if the heavy marijuana users actually do have heart disease. The research done on the health effects of even heavy marijuana smokers show little if any difference between cannabis users and their non-using counterparts, and some studies even show a benefit from cannabis in treating hypertension.

However, overeating, drinking alcohol, and smoking tobacco are proven to have deleterious effects on the heart and on health. I doubt we’re going to see any major effort to arrest the users of those substances, though.


More information can be found at the Marijuana Policy Project website

After seeing this article, I got curious and find some average cannabis consumption rates from the real world. Now, I couldn't just go out and ask folks this sort of question, so I went where I knew I could get some pretty accurate answers. My online friends at Rollitup.org are helping to build a picture of average daily usage by smokers.

If you read this and you smoke, pop over and see the figures so far (this site is for 18+ Internet users sorry) Maybe you could join and contribute with your daily average usage.

Twelve hours into the poll, 42 punters have given their input with 40% of people being in the 1 to 2 gram window. There are only 4 users, or 9.5% that are doing more than 7 grams a day.
Hopefully this poll will get a few more contributing to get a good picture.
Personally, I doubt that we'll see a huge number of 7 gram plus smokers.

Saturday, May 10, 2008

Anti-pot Blogger Censors and Deletes Pro-cannabis Comments

Time to rant. I was going to try and keep this blog civil. However...

I was polite. I pointed out his profile description and then suggested he do some research on the report he was quoting. I then pointed out how the ONDCP Director is obliged to discount or discredit any reports that might suggest that cannabis has medicinal uses. I then pointed the blog author to some research about cannabis and directed him to my blog.

I posted the comment and a couple of hours later I'd been banned from the comments page. The comment had gone up originally because I checked. I guess facts mean nothing to this author, so I'll respond to the blog post here. I won't pull the entire post apart though. My responses are inline (the bold text in the quote was added by Avi Green):


Teens who smoke cannabis risk being on dependency leash and mental illness

A new report being released by the US government warns of the hazards teenagers can face:
WASHINGTON - Depression, teens and marijuana are a dangerous mix that can lead to dependency, mental illness or suicidal thoughts, according to a White House report being released Friday.

A teen who has been depressed at some point in the past year is more than twice as likely to have used marijuana as teens who have not reported being depressed — 25 percent compared with 12 percent, said the report by the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

"Marijuana is a more consequential substance of abuse than our culture has treated it in the last 20 years," said John Walters, director of the office. "This is not just youthful experimentation that they'll get over as we used to think in the past."

Smoking marijuana can lead to more serious problems, Walters said in an interview.

For example, using marijuana increases the risk of developing mental disorders by 40 percent, the report said. And teens who smoke pot at least once a month over a yearlong period are three times more likely to have suicidal thoughts than nonusers, it said.

The report also cited research that showed that teens who smoke marijuana when feeling depressed were more than twice as likely as their peers to abuse or become addicted to pot — 8 percent compared with 3 percent.

Experts who have worked with children say there's nothing harmless about marijuana.

"I've seen many, many kids' lives negatively impacted and taken off track because of marijuana," said Elizabeth Stanley-Salazar, director of adolescent services for Phoenix House treatment centers in California. "It's somewhat Russian roulette. There are so many factors, emotional, psychological, biological. You can't predict the experimentation and how it will impact a kid."

The drug control policy office analyzed about a dozen studies looking at marijuana use, including research by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

Overall, marijuana use among teens has decreased 25 percent since 2001, down to about 2.3 million kids who used pot at least once a month, the drug control office said.

While the drop is encouraging, Walters appealed to parents to recognize signs of possible drug use and depression.

"It's not something you look the other way about when your teen starts appearing careless about their grooming, withdrawing from the family, losing interest in daily activities," Walters said. "Find out what's wrong."


In the first part of my comment to Avi, I quoted his 'profile' statement:

"...I maintain a strong belief in the public's right to knowledge and accuracy in facts. I like to think of myself as a conservative-style version of Clark Kent. I do not know if I'll ever be as good as him, but I do my best."

I think I then suggested that rather than take one link to a Yahoo news post as reference, look for the original report from the ONDCP (PDF) and then check up the sources that the ONDCP has cited. Then do some research for anything that may contradict those reports and studies. I then explained to him how the Director of the ONDCP is obliged to lie when it comes to the cannabis debate. I chose not to make any comments about the rest of his post, but hey, he removed my comment, so I think I have the right to analyze this post fully now.

I'll leave you to read the rest of his post now, so you can decide what you think of Avi Green. My opinion is that he is more bigoted / racist than the people he accuses of same. I also believe that Avi Green would never let the truth get in the way of his blog, because the truth and facts don't count at 'Tel-Chai Nation', it's just another comic book fantasy. You will note that Avi lambasts a Canadian commenter in this post, and takes him to task for attempting to limit his right of free speech. Well, I guess I can add that I think Avi Green is a hypocrite. Besides limiting free speech in direct contrast to his published views on free speech, Avrem also contradicts his persona in an FAQ that says:

"...I'd been coming to the conclusion that he was simply too attached to the media establishment and the Main-Stream Media's (MSM for short) way of thinking, which is what some would call "politically correct." It's a viewpoint and an approach that I simply cannot identify with..."

So why do you quote mainstream media as if it were gospel Avrem?

Years ago, I knew an extremely racist 19-year old on a message board, supposedly from Perth, Australia, who said that he smoked weed "on occasion", and indicated that he hung out with some pretty shady characters, not unlike himself. You could wonder if his abuse of the substance led him in part to be racist, but who knows? What I certainly do know, is that he was one filthy little left-wing bigot, and I'm not even sure if he really was from Australia, because his last name, "Erceg" which he gave at one point, sounded more Hungarian.

Oh, and while we're on the subject, I also was once yelled at on another topic I once wrote by a blabbermouth named "Steve" who certainly did come from Canada, who wrote the following comment:

Your claim that marijuana destroys creativity is blatantly and totally false. Some people would claim that it enhances creativity, which I don't believe -- except to the extent that feeling relaxed might help.

You can't even count the number of people who used marijuana and were creative, however -- and it only takes one to prove you wrong. In addition to Carl Sagan, I present for your consideration Pierre Berton. Berton was the most famous and important Canadian non-fiction writer of all time. He wrote 50 books, and won the Governor-General's award three times, the Queen Elizabeth II Silver Jubilee Medal AND Golden Jubilee Medal, the Nellie Award for the best public affairs broadcaster in Canadian radio, and the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. He was a Companion of the Order of Canada. While doing all this, he also enjoyed using marijuana for 40 years.

Before you say anything about marijuana and creativity, read Sagan's The Demon-Haunted World, and Berton's The Last Spike and The Arctic Grail. Then face facts.

Heh heh heh. Carl Sagan? That daydreamer? As Debbie Schlussel says:

Uh, wasn't that the same Carl Sagan who told us that Reagan's nukes would soon result in nuclear winter? Sagan died, nuclear winter never happened, and Ronald Reagan's steadfastness on our nuke build-up helped bring down the Communist Soviet Union. Sorry, but pot use does not equal genius, just fantasy.

That poor little putz from Canada who blabbered about Sagan and Berton sure does fantasize himself as well. He should pay attention to Debbie, who certainly knows a lot better than he does. "Steve" then went on to say, after I'd pointed out that people like him, from what I could tell, were ultra-leftists:

You obviously did not check the facts about Pierre Berton. If you had, you would know that my statements are true.

America's position on drugs is in fact ridiculous, and the majority of Americans know it, including such ultra-leftists as William F. Buckley, Jr.:

http://www.nationalreview.com/12feb96/drug.html
Whoops, that's where you know that something's wrong, when he doesn't properly acknowledge the fact that Buckley was an ultra-rightist (but a phony at that!). And when he starts insulting Americans by implying that they're stupid. In other words, this kook whose comments I display here was - what else? - an addict himself. Poor man. He must be out of his mind, and he's certainly an embarrassment unto Canada. And attempting to govern someone else's right to free speech, he dares? Dear dear dear.

And Berton, while he may not have deteriorated over the short term, certainly could have over the long term, and it's possible that he didn't even first chug cannabis when he wrote all his books. So message to "Steve": take your crud about Berton and Sagan and stick it down your bottom.

Lastly, why do I use the actual name of this drug instead of the slang "marijuana"? I gave the answer to that earlier. Yes, I think it's insulting, so I'm not using that particular slang again, period.

Update: The Washington Post has an interesting related article that tells how teenage girls are especially at risk if they gobble cannabis.
Avi, the Washington Post link reads the same as the Yahoo news link! Look, the report here says:
"Teen girls are especially at risk. In fact, three times
as many girls (12%) as boys (4%) experienced
depression during the year.
Another study confirms
that girls are more likely than boys to report feelings
of sadness or hopelessness (37% vs. 29%).

Substance abuse can compound the problem.
Girls who smoke marijuana daily are significantly
more likely to develop symptoms of depression and
anxiety: their odds are more than five times higher
than those of girls who do not smoke marijuana"
Hang on a minute! That last update wasn't there when my comment got posted! Avi, are you being a hypocrite and not allowing facts to get in the way of some hysteria?

Avrem, you throw insults around like confetti at a wedding. I would suggest that you have never heard of Carl Sagan except for the small snippet in some gossip columnist's rave about Kirsten Dunst and a reference to her friend's father.

I'm sure the last part of my comment re your post read:

I'm happy to debate this 'report' with you anytime Avi, as I believe this issue is too important to ignore.

The offer still stands.

Unfortunately I think you'll just call me an 'addict' and resort to childish postings much like this one (and yes, I do mean *my* post). It's much the same as yours.

Friday, May 9, 2008

Petitions, Videos and US Federal Cannabis Supply

I'm in the middle of researching and posting about the plethora of conflicting reports about cannabis/marijuana/THC/ and it's effects on human health. It is a far bigger job than I expected it to be (I want *real* information, not media blurb). So in the meantime, check this out...

First, a petition to the US Congress to ... well, it doesn't say. It does list a heap of information about the medicinal benefits of cannabis though. I guess you can sign it or leave it depending on your paranoia level.

Second, the Marijuana Policy Project has released a new series of commercials to be aired, including this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dH132JP5_Cc):




MINNEAPOLIS — Proponents of a bill to protect seriously ill patients from arrest for using medical marijuana with a doctor's recommendation released their latest TV ad today featuring former Fillmore County sheriff and state representative Neil Haugerud, who suffers from severe, intractable pain due to inflammation of the spine.

Opposition to the bill, which according to a new KSTP poll has the support of 64 percent of Minnesotans and has already passed the Senate, has been largely confined to a handful of members of the law enforcement community. Gov. Tim Pawlenty has threatened to veto the bill as long as law enforcement opposes it, but advocates and patients maintain that that opposition relies on false, misleading arguments.

"Law enforcement I think is stepping out of bounds," Haugerud says in the ad. "Law enforcement is there to enforce the laws in relation to what the law is – they really don't need to influence ... what the law should be." The new ad is online at http://minnesotacares.org/Ads_video.html.

"Neil Haugerud knows this issue from both sides – as a longtime sheriff, and now as a patient suffering severe pain every day, who might benefit from medical marijuana," said Neal Levine, director of state campaigns for the Marijuana Policy Project. "We urge the House to quickly send this to the governor’s desk, and hope that Governor Pawlenty will reject the misinformation coming from a few in law enforcement and sign this compassionate, tightly crafted bill into law."



Third:

The US Federal Government has an anniversary due. On the 10th of May, 1978, the US Federal Government began supplying medical marijuana to patients. Wha...? I hear you say? Read more at The Marijuana Policy Project website, or read a good coverage on Alternet.


And last but not least:

Mick Hume, a columnist at The Times Online recently posted this opinion piece online and has received some flak.

In part:

If there is anything duller than a dopehead, it is the endless debate about whether cannabis should be Class B or C. Frankly, who gives an F? The classification system makes as much sense as a spliffed-up student discussing moral philosophy. It bears little relation to the risks or popularity of any drug.

Magic mushrooms, for example, are Class A even though, as one doctor says, “it is doubtful whether they ever cause more than a bellyache”. Ecstasy's Class A status has not dissuaded a generation of users from inducing a dance-trance that appears more moronic than ecstatic. Ritalin remains a Class B drug, yet is freely doled out to “hyperactive” children. As for cannabis, its popularity has fallen since it was last downgraded to C.

Might that have something to do with those ministers admitting that they tried it? Perhaps Ms Smith's best preventative option would be to declare that dope is now officially classed C for Cool.

Or maybe new Labour should give up the attempt to reclassify itself as a Class A Government by waging another phoney war on drugs, and instead try inspiring young people with something more mind-expanding than dope.

Full opinion piece is here.

I responded with the following:

I think you've missed the point folks.

Mick is just saying what generations of non-smokers have possibly thought in their lifetimes. I think if you read the last four paragraphs where Mick finally gets to the point (are you *sure* you're not a closet stoner Mr Hume?), you'll see he has some valid points to make.

Mick Hume may not have any compassion for wannabe intellectuals who think a scoob at a party makes them a veteran cannabis expert and fighter 'for the cause'. He may also prefer a night on the piss in the pub, watching football with his mates rather than a few bongs around the lounge. However, he does make the point that the government should get off their arses, give up the 'class' argument and start teaching young people about the negative effects of cannabis abuse.

In my opinion, the education campaign should also point out the many medical benefits of marijuana, and the many uses for industrial hemp. Then we will be able to get away from the politicking and get some facts into kids' heads, rather than have them influenced by hysteria and propaganda from both sides of the pot argument.

Cheers,
Indica Man
http://itsmedicinejim.blogspot.com

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Reclassification Not The Answer in UK

Colin Blakemore writes in Comment is Free...

'Hysteria Over Cannabis is Getting in the Way of the Truth'

...The classification was changed in 2004. Ever since, the government has seemed uncomfortable. Successive Home Secretaries - Charles Clarke in 2005 and Jacqui Smith last year - have gone through the ritual of asking the ACMD if they are really sure.

What, then, are the concerns? First, cannabis remains the most commonly used illegal drug. But its use has been falling steadily since 2000, with no hint that this decline was affected by reclassification. Home Office statistics show that cannabis use by 16- to 24-year-olds has fallen by about 20 per cent since 2004. So, if we naively argue from correlations (the basis of so much of the evidence about harm), returning cannabis to B would be expected to increase its use.

Second, there is concern about the message that reclassification has sent. But there is no evidence that classification influences the attitude of young people to drugs. Amphetamines, cocaine and ecstasy are all runners-up to cannabis in the league table of popularity in this country - and they are all class A. Usage of cocaine has grown over the past eight years, as that of cannabis has declined. Third, there is, quite rightly, a particular worry about young people. Yet the the government's own figures show that only one 11-year-old in 150 has tried cannabis in the last year, while 4 per cent have sniffed glue and fully 21 per cent have drunk alcohol.

Indeed, glue-sniffing and drinking (neither of which is regulated under the Misuse of Drugs Act) are the dominant drug problems among school children. About 5 per cent of 11- and 12-year-olds admit to having been drunk at least once in the past month. And among all boys under the age of 16 who said that they had drunk alcohol in the past month, 11 per cent reported being involved in a fight and 2 per cent had ended up in hospital!

Finally, there is the issue of a possible link between cannabis use, especially the stronger varieties now on the street, and mental health problems. Parents are now more worried that their children will become schizophrenic than they were five years ago, that they would get a criminal record.

We should take very seriously the growing evidence of a link between cannabis smoking and psychosis. But this is still in the realm of correlation rather than causation. Cigarette-smoking and drinking are also very high among young people heading for schizophrenia, but no one has suggested that they cause psychosis. And what of the alarming stories of horrifyingly powerful 'skunk'? Some newspapers have told us that the level of THC, the active ingredient, in street cannabis today is 20 or 30 times higher than 10 years ago. That would be rather surprising, given that THC content was 7 per cent on average in 1995...


Read more here

Comment is Free

The Guardian

The Observer

Monday, May 5, 2008

Cannabis Legalization: Australia Should Look at The Netherlands

Following on from my previous post about Dr. Alex Wodak's thoughts on cannabis in Australia, we should take a good look at the latest financial figures in respect to cannabis in the netherlands.

The 'Crossroads' blog pointed me to this page on the NIS News Bulletin site. The NIS is a paper focussed towards Westerners in The Netherlands who only speak English.

They've reported on tax figures for the Dutch Government through the sale of cannabis in 'CoffeeShops'.

AMSTERDAM, 03/05/08 - The Dutch state earns 400 million euros annually in tax revenues from 'coffee shops,' as the Dutch cannabis cafes are called. Sales in the sector total around 2 billion euros, according to conservative estimates by TV programme Reporter.

Reporter calculates that the some 730 coffee shops in the Netherlands sell around 265,000 kilos of hashish and cannabis annually. The bulk of this is grown in the Netherlands. Although coffee-shop owners do not have to pay VAT, the tax service does calculate income tax at the highest rate of around 52 percent.

In fixing the tax rate, the tax service assumes that the selling price of grass is twice the purchasing price. In Amsterdam, where coffee shops often have non-price-conscious foreign tourists as customers, the tax man actually applies gross profit margins of 150 to 180 percent.

The Australian Government could do worse than at least consider a similar model to the Netherlands. Perhaps the revenue could be used for further medicinal research and education campaigns as Dr. Wodak suggested at Nimbin during Mardi Grass.

About Crossroads (from their site)
Crossroads is an English-language web magazine for expatriates in the Maastricht area. First launched in print form in December 2001, Crossroads caters to the many international institutes and the expatriate community in Maastricht.

Readers will find a fresh selection of local and national news, as well as a variety of exclusive in-depth articles about living and working in Maastricht.

In its online format, Crossroads aims at becoming a platform for dialogue and exchange of ideas by inviting readers to post in their own comments to the various news stories.

Crossroads is published by the Maastricht-based European Journalism Centre.

About the NIS News Bulletin (from their site):
Serving the Foreign Community
To non-Dutch speakers, understanding the Netherlands can be challenging. English-language news sources are scarce. And virtually without exception, they focus on ‘the expat’. But who is he?
Do non-Dutch speakers in the Netherlands really want to learn ‘what’s on’ and where to dine out?
Perhaps. But what about the diplomats, businesspeople and other international decision-makers who require accurate, reliable and timely information on political, social and economic developments? They read NIS News Bulletin.

Sell Cannabis at the Post Office!



Interesting news has come from the Nimbin MardiGrass. Dr. Alex Wodak, Director of the Alcohol and Drug Service at St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney Australia, has delivered a presentation advocating the full legalization of cannabis and using Australia Post as the delivery point to consumers.


The Northern Rivers Echo has good coverage here.
Excerpts:

Dr Wodak has been the director of the Alcohol and Drug Service at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney since 1982. He is the president of both the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation and the International Harm Reduction Association and has published more than 200 scientific papers.



Doctor Wodak's model makes good sense from whatever side you look at it.

Dr Alex Wodak believes the reason cannabis is a big issue in Australia is because it is in such high demand, with more than two million people consuming it.

“In 1997, $5 billion was spent by people buying cannabis, twice as much spent by wine consumers, and because it’s illicit, it’s not taxed,” Dr Wodak said.

“If we can tax and regulate cannabis, then we could have health warnings like we do on tobacco, like ‘smoking might cause schizophrenia’; advertise help lines, so if people want to stop or cut down they can ring this number; restrict the age of sale, like alcohol, and not sell to pregnant women. We could use some of the income from taxes to pay for better prevention and treatment programs.”


He goes on to say:

Dr Wodak said that if cannabis was legalised, it could ensure people were aware how much tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, they were consuming.

“At the moment there is no control over THC concentration and it’s a drug regulated by criminals and corrupt police,” he said.
“Inevitably where there is contact between black-market criminals and police there is rampant police corruption. If we want to get tough on police corruption and the cause of it, then logically the thing to do is to tax and regulate cannabis to take the black market away from corrupt police.”

Dr Wodak said there was still more research needed on the links between mental illness and marijuana use.
“A lot of people with mental health problems smoke a lot, but it’s a chicken and egg question,” he said. “There is no doubt some people with schizophrenia start to smoke more to try and control the symptoms.

“There will be continued debate in the psychiatric fields about what can precipitate severe mental illness.
“There is more support for the notion that cannabis use can exacerbate a pre-existing mental health condition. In public policy the onus of proof should be on maximum public safety.”


Check out the Nimbin Hemp Festival 'Mardi Grass' here.
Update: The Sydney Morning Herald has reported as well.


Saturday, May 3, 2008

Cannabis and Brain Cell Growth

Could it be possible that in the future, cannabis will help restore lost brain function?
It has been a long held belief among the anti-pot community that the evil weed Marijuana kills brain cells. I reported in an earlier post that researchers discovered that cannabinoids can actually kill GBM cancer cells while leaving healthy cells intact. I was looking through a few sites today and found some research that was done back in 2005 that suggests cannabinoids could induce brain cell growth as well as provide anti-depressant and anxiety relieving effects.

When will governments finally take notice of these studies and encourage and fund further research into cannabis and it's medicinal value? Prior to prohibition, cannabis was an ingredient in some sixty percent of all medicines in the US.

Cannabis has been proven to reduce or eliminate neurological pain .

The American College of Physicians has called for further research into cannabis' therapeutic value.

I guess that while there are job criteria that specify that people must lie about cannabis (I speak specifically about the Director of the US Office of National Drug Control Policy), it will continue to be an uphill battle to get cannabis the medicinal status that it deserves.

Friday, May 2, 2008

Water More Addictive than Marijuana

I love this comment! In a news article about South Australia banning bongs, some comments were posted. This one provides a perfect example of how facts and statistics can be manipulated; something that mainstream media and anti-pot propagandists do all the time.

'Matt' from Melbourne in Victoria (Australia) showed us how to do it:

In the 47 years since Cannabis Prohibition was formally established Billions of dollars have been spent trying to find a scientific basis for the lies of prohibition and the most they can come up with is that high level abuse of Cannabis "may" trigger schizophrenic symptoms in some of those people the have a genetic predisposition to schizophrenia. er deh and peanuts cause anaphylaxis in people with a genetic predisposition to peanut allergy! If you get a bad response to something you take DON'T USE IT. Just because a small number of people have a bad response to a substance, should we ban it for all? No, or we would have to ban just about everything in the world including water. According to strict scientific classification Water is an highly addictive psychoactive substance. Withdrawal symptoms include headache, nausea, delirium, hallucinations, coma and death. Overdose causes delirium intoxication and heart failure. We are all addicted and must keep up our habit daily to survive. the ratio between the medical effective dose (MED), I.e. a glass of water (200ml) and the fatal overdose (FD) (approx. 8 litres) is around 1:40. Most "pharmaceuticals" have a ratio of 1:15, Cannabis has a MED-FD Ratio of greater than 1:10000 So in fact Cannabis is actually "Safer" than water in that it is virtually impossible to overdose on it.


Thanks Matt, you've made me smile :o)