Colorado's Cannabis Users.

[sandyRoe]

If, as is said, cannabis can cause serious mental health problems how long will be before the psychiatric hospitals there, where this drug is now legal, will be packed with its victims?

[Khandro]

"The dose makes the poison" (Latin: ''sola dosis facit venenum'') is an adage intended to indicate a basic principle of toxicology. It is credited to Paracelsus who expressed the classic toxicology maxim "All things are poison and nothing is without poison; only the dose makes a thing not a poison." This is often condensed to: "The dose makes the poison" or in Latin "Sola dosis facit venenum". It means that a substance can produce the harmful effect associated with its toxic properties only if it reaches a susceptible biological system within the body in a high enough concentration.

[AB Editor]

Morning Sandy. What made you ask the question?

The mental health issues you're describing usually turn up decades later - I read something about the suicide rate in men who took drugs in their earlier years being much higher. Most of these men were in their early 40s. Drug use in their teens was described as one of the things which lead to their anxiety, depression, etc.

[sandyRoe]

I think it was the announcement of the death of Howard Marks promoted my question. He only ever dealt in cannabis and by all accounts was a personable pusher.
http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/mr-nice-howard-marks-dies-aged-70/ar-BBrAuiy?li=BBoPWjQ

[ummmm]

I think it depends what type you use.

[steg]

How long? You could try checking other places that have legalised/decriminalised cannabis and use them as a marker

[ummmm]

Like Amsterdam?

[steg]

Aye, how long after decriminalisation did it take to fill Amsterdam's psychiatric hospitals with its "victims"

[Peter Pedant]

good contribution from Khandro
I think that was the basis for taking small amounts of poison to build up a resistance to larger doses. Practice popular in the seventeenth century - isnt that the basis of panacea ?

things have moved on since then

yeah I was thinking of Howard Marks - I think he was a good publicist to be honest. the film is well a film - I dont think it tells it like it is.

The final chapter of Freakonomics is worth a read
Why do most drug dealers live with their marm ?

They dont make much - so little they cant live independently is the answer.

as for drug use and psychiatric probs - you have to unwind whether they had a predisposition to problems and were self treating with cannabis. - in other words which came first.

[Clanad]

Khando's ''sola dosis facit venenum'' certainly fills the bill for describing the expense and frustration felt by neighboring States, including my own, when they try to curb the distribution of the high quality cannabis legally purchased in Colorado from being imported illegally into their own States. A little discussed consequence of one State allowing something that many (if not most) other States forbid...

[Peter Pedant]

clanad I thought that was the whole point of state law
that it could be different from other states

andif it is gonna be different it is well you know not the same


otherwise have only federal law over the whole of the land of the free and hey presto uniformity of law and practice ( hem hem )

and hey ! only two hundred years ago some states allowed slavery and erm some didnt.

[Togo]

Is there any evidence that more people are using cannabis in Colorado, since it was de-regulated, or are the people who were prepared to use it although illegal still the main market?

[wolf63]

I am sure that I had read of a state legalising the use of Cannabis for period pains. I can't remember which state it was. How can you prove that you need it for this reason? Being female would be a starting point I suppose.

Premenstrual syndrome might be a good problem to prescribe it for - I am usually a pretty easy going person but once the PMS cloud descends I change into a short tempered murderous man hater. My male dog used to avoid me like the plague.

[Peter Pedant]

ooo I like evidence based questions ...

but sales pre-de-regulation would be hard to estimate
do drug dealers fill in tax returns - I cant remember if the lately dead nice Mr Marks ever sweated over one .....

so you would have to rely on historical reports - somewhat inflatable or fallible I would have thought

[stuey]

Petah, by "inflatable" do you mean, well...High?

[EDDIE51]

Clanad , Who is selling the Cannabis in Colorado? Is it the same , now legal, dealers who used to sell it when it was illegal? Is it sold by commercial companies through normal shops like tobacco and alcohol? Or it is supplied by 'official' sources free of charge or at a fixed price ?
Are all types of Cannabis legal in Colarado ? The stuff sold in the UK now is 'skunk weed' far higher in strength than the old 'grass' many of us tried back in the 1960 s /70 s .

[Peter Pedant]

stoo - how kind of you to contribute
and are the outlets called - can-I-buy ? well you can now ...

Eddie I dont think the dealers ripped their bandanas off = took a breath and said - thank god it is legal now and I wont have trouble getting people to hear my best prices....

but you know - anything can happen in America

[CrapAtCryptics]

Apart from the mental effects the physical is caused by the higher burning temperature of cannabis which damages the fabric of the lungs more quickly than tobacco thus restricting the oxygen flow to body and brain. Maybe thats where the mental problems start to.

[Peter Pedant]

crap - do you have a reference for that ?
not the higher burning temp
but that it is lung damaging .... TIA

[CrapAtCryptics]

It was in an American Lung Association report I read a while ago and confirmed by a similar Canadian report about the same time.

[Old_Geezer]

Well other States could solve the problem by legalising it also. Not wishing to make every States related thread the same subject but; it occurs to me that globally countries that don't allow citizens to have guns (generally) also get a similar problem from countries that allow their citizens freedom to arm themselves. Awkward problem generally, this smuggling racket.