Posted on 01/10/2008 3:34:16 PM PST by knighthawk
The public health impact of the Government's decision to downgrade cannabis is disclosed today in official figures showing a 50 per cent rise in the number of people requiring medical treatment after using the drug.
Since cannabis was downgraded from a Class B to a Class C drug, the number of adults being treated in hospitals and clinics in England for its effects has risen to more than 16,500 a year. In addition, the number of children needing medical attention after smoking the drug has risen to more than 9,200.
Almost 500 adults and children are treated in hospitals and clinics every week for the effects of cannabis.
Its health toll is revealed in official data compiled by health authorities and obtained by The Daily Telegraph.
Drug campaigners last night said the figures proved Labour's decision to reclassify cannabis in January 2004, which made the penalties for its possession less severe, was badly mistaken and had sent out the wrong signals about it being a "soft" drug.
Doctors say cannabis abuse can contribute to mental health problems including forms of psychosis, paranoia and schizophrenia. There can be harmful physical side-effects, disrupting blood pressure and exacerbating heart and circulation disorders.
The data will add to the pressure on Gordon Brown to reverse its reclassification when a review of the decision by Home Office scientific advisers concludes in the Spring.
Elizabeth Burton-Phillips, a leading campaigner on drug issues since her son, Nick Mills, killed himself in despair at his addiction four years ago, said: "These results are shocking and dreadful. What more evidence do you need? You cannot sweep this under the carpet any longer. Children have to be told of the dangers of this what is wrongly called a soft-drug. It is extremely dangerous and it is destroying healthy, young minds."
James Clappison, a Conservative member of the Commons home affairs committee, said: "The reclassification of cannabis sent the wrong message and was clearly the wrong decision. These figures show the evident dangers of cannabis abuse and support the case for the drug being restored to Category B."
The health authority figures show that 16,685 adults were treated by English hospital trusts after abusing cannabis in 2006-07. The previous year, it was 14,828 - up from 11,057 in 2004-05.
The data also shows that the number of children treated for using cannabis has risen from 8,014 in 2005-06 to 9,259 last year. In total, 25,944 people were treated for cannabis use last year - around 498 a week. In addition, around 70,000 people are treated for mental disorder as outpatients each year.
The figures suggest health authorities are treating more people for cannabis abuse than there are patients who have heart bypass operations or treatment for colon cancer. Some 21,000 people a year have a bypass operation and colon cancer is contracted by some 22,000 people a year.
Downgrading cannabis to a Class C drug placed it alongside steroids and some prescription anti-depressants. Possession of them can lead to a two-year prison sentence, but charges are rarely brought against people found with small quantities of such drugs.
Class B drugs however, include more dangerous substances such as amphetamines. People found in possession of Class B drugs can face a five-year jail term and an unlimited fine.
There is no "substitute medication" available to treat cannabis problems, so the majority of National Health Service treatment is carried out by psychiatrists, therapists and counsellors.
The independent review into its reclassification, by the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, was prompted by growing concern about the increasing prevalence of new high-strength forms of cannabis. So-called "super-skunk" leaves can be twice as potent as more traditional cannabis resin.
Advocates of downgrading or legalising cannabis say the risks are low compared to those of alcohol and tobacco. Some sufferers of chronic conditions like multiple sclerosis say the drug provides vital pain relief.
Many doctors say the risks outweigh the benefits, and the British Medical Association yesterday said the latest treatment figures strengthened its opposition to the decision to downgrade the drug.
A BMA spokesman said: "This is drug that is mostly smoked, so that can cause lung damage and cancer. There are also concerns about the potential negative effect cannabis has on users' psychiatric state."
Addaction, a charity that treats people with drug problems, warned that children suffered particularly from cannabis abuse. "Young people often use cannabis at crucial development stages in their lives, and it does have serious impacts on mental health and physical development," a spokesman said.
Last night, the Department of Health insisted that the rising numbers of treatments reflect improvements in drug treatment and not rising cannabis use.
However, the department also announced yesterday that the budget for the National Treatment Agency, which co-ordinates drug treatment, will be frozen at 2007 levels for the next three years. The agency will also be expected to find "efficiency savings" of £50 million a year from its £398 million annual budget.
Despite the freeze in his budget, Paul Hayes, the head of the agency, insisted that the number of drug treatments it can fund will rise.
"By becoming more efficient at delivering the best outcomes for individuals we will be able to continue to increase the number of people into treatment, while increasing treatment effectiveness," he said.
Andrew Lansley, the Conservative health spokesman, said Labour was wasting vast amounts of money. "The Government is ignoring the fact that its drug treatment policy is fundamentally misguided. Conservatives have promised to introduce abstinence-based treatment for drug addicts to help them get off drugs for good," he said.
Ping
How many died? 0
how about this deal: if you use pot, don’t expect government health care.
A few weeks ago I was in the hospital ER waiting for a CT scan (it turned out to be nothing), and across the hall was a younger guy with his girlfriend (??).
I suppose the boredom caused me to eavesdrop a bit, and from what I could tell the guy had suffered some kind of panic/breathing/paranoia attack from smoking pot. I figured I must have heard it wrong or had missed something, because I’d never heard of someone actually visiting ER from pot-smoking.
But there you have it.
“how about this deal: if you use pot, don’t expect government health care.”
You mean that only pot heads should get good medical care?
Compared to how many a day for alcohol abuse?
Good for the goose:
Doctors refuse to fix builder’s broken ankle unless he quits smoking
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=481617&in_page_id=1770
Hospitalized for what? Overdose of snack foods.
Wankers
Pot of the 70’s was in the 6% range for THC, today’s pot can reach 20% THC levels and the side effects of high doses often come with rapid heartbeat & anxiety, sometimes scary but hardly life threatening.
Haven't smoked in years and won't go back, but as I recall the worst health hazard was shrapnel from a popping seed. That was back when pot had seeds. Yes, it really did.
I have a sore elbow. Do you think...
What silliness. What possible “treatment” could there be?
Some Fritos and a nap? Maybe in extreme cases some peanut butter and Ritz crackers. And a nap.
What treatment? Cheetos and sleep? Give me a break. No one buys the propaganda anymore.
Compared to how many a day for alcohol abuse?
**********************************************
This is England we’re talking about , they probably have that many deaths attributed to “drink driving” as they call it...
First:
was prompted by growing concern about the increasing prevalence of new high-strength forms of cannabis. So-called "super-skunk" leaves can be twice as potent as more traditional cannabis resin.
"Super skunk" used in this sense is a meaningless buzz word used to evoke emotion in the reader. Skunk is just a strain name. Super skunk is also a strain name. Also, leaves? Why mention leaves? The author is revealed as clueless from this statement alone. Next, define "traditional" cannabis. Super potent weed has been around forever. Ask any old hippie. The only thing that has changed is the breeding has become refined. You can still get Mexican ditch weed at 3% THC, and you can still get commercial strains sold by seed banks around 15%-20% THC. Actually the more potent is better for you, because you smoke less. Potency is 99.99999% genetics and anyone that tells you otherwise is a liar. I have pictures of black jazz musicians dancing in my head after reading this garbage.
A BMA spokesman said: "This is drug that is mostly smoked, so that can cause lung damage and cancer.
Another flat out lie. Lung damage from inhaling smoke? Of course. Cancer? Not a chance in hell.
“This is a concerted propaganda effort... “
Conspiracy kook nonsense...
There’s no evidence of that, just clear evidence that dope f~ks up people’s lives and that legalization would make it worse.
It's possible if he got ahold of a pure sativa. Or it could have been laced with something.
If you believe that people are only bound by laws and not morals. I guess as soon as you were old enough to legally buy alcohol and tobacco you became an addict, didn't you? If not, then you just disproved your own theory.
Been a very long time, but I recall somebody once said the stuff was sometimes enhanced with other stuff.
The world needs more poisons that are “no worse than alcohol”!..../sarc
Okay, I am not at all advocating it’s use but I smoked it like it was going out of style when I was younger and this is BS. I never went to the ER nor did I ever do any other drug.
pot doesn’t cause paranoia, cops cause paranoia....
O.K., so you smoke less if it is more powerful. As a reformed pothead I can assure you, no amount of the stuff will kill you.
Like you said, if it is more powerful there is less smoking involved
We agree. BTW, Reformed Pothead, does that mean you no longer smoke it but instead use a vaporizer?
Wankers
LOL!! STOP Your making my bong hit shoot out my nose!!
Ho-ho’s are yummy, or so I hear.
There was probably 20% THC pot back in the seventies too. I know they found samples in the high teens at least as far back as the early seventies. According to what I’ve read from the DEA and ONDCP when I dug into their sites is that overall average THC levels of seized marijuana are only in the 6 or 8% range today. Most of that police seize in this country is cheapo Mexican pot that’s around 5% or so THC on average. Even the potent indoor grown sinsemilla they find in fancy indoor grow rooms is rarely over 15% THC, but they claim to have found some higher even than 30%.
I wasn’t old enough in the early seventies to be smoking pot, but I was smoking it in the late seventies and there was really crappy pot out there and really good pot, more of the former than the later. Even back then I know I saw people get extremely anxious or sort of paranoid when they smoked pot. I’ve seen them hyperventilate, throw up, just go into all sorts of histrionics. It was always someone with little or no experience smoking pot who would get really high and it would scare the heck out of them. It could be especially bad if they ate the pot. People who don't know what they are doing will often eat way too much. When you smoke it you feel the effects pretty quickly and you usually know when you've smoked enough to reach the point you want to reach. It takes forever to feel it when you eat it so if you don't know what you are doing it's easy to eat way too much thinking it's not working only to find out after a few minutes that you are way higher than you ever wanted to be. And to make matters worse it takes hours and hours to wear off if you eat it so your stuck that way just hoping it will end some time soon. I know I sure didn't like being really really high either, but I never freaked out and went to the hospital or anything. That would be embarrassing.
Did you read the one recently about the police officer in Detroit who took marijuana from suspects and had his wife make pot brownies? He freaked out when they ate them convinced himself he was dying and called 911 and ended up admitting what he had done. He was allowed to resign. Some people are just idiots.
Agreed. I once worked in a psychiatric hospital and saw thousands of patients admitted. I don't recall even a single one who came to us for help with marijuana alone. Their problems were with alcohol, cocaine, heroin or methamphetamine. They'd have been a lot better off sticking to the ganja.
The prohibitionists are cooking the books on this.
-ccm
“If you believe that people are only bound by laws and not morals. I guess as soon as you were old enough to legally buy alcohol and tobacco you became an addict, didn’t you? If not, then you just disproved your own theory.”
Read carefully and learn to differentiate between “only bound by” and effected by.
Perhaps true among those with no interest in dope, but I bet close to 99% of users knew penalties were just reduced by 60%.
Panama Red and Columbian Gold were around back then. They lean heavy sativa and can easily hit 15-20%, even back in the day. A heavy sativa can cause those side effects you're referring to - paranoia, nausea, and rapid heartbeat. An indica won't do that.
A few weeks ago I heard a story that a cop's wife spiked his brownies to get him to flunk the piss test and get out of the service. Might or might not be two takes on the same story. If I were high, I'd call it a conspiracy...
Did downgrading it’s classification result in more people being treated after using it, or more people willing to admit to having used it when they go for treatment?
That's probably because they were nothing like Britian's draconian 5 years,... now reduced to 2. People tend to be roughly aware of a penalty for something they're doing that would likely send them to jail rather than just cost them money and screw up their record.
My guess is that it's some of both, also more people willing to hit the ER after getting too high and scared.
I wonder if its just ‘acceptable’ to report usage, and not a real ‘increase’.
Smoking pot affects people different ways. My neighbor in college became belligerent. A lot of gang bangers smoke pot and they aren’t exactly navel-gazing. One of my roomies showed no effect whatsoever. My other roomie looked like death when he was high.
I am extremely sensitive to dope. One hit and I am crushed. If I ever get cancer......
I’ve never heard of someone having to go to the hospital for smoking pot?
I'm kind of leery about taking this kind of information at face value. I saw a report on alcohol-related traffic accident injuries, and it turned out that if you showed up at the hospital for treatment of traffic accident injuries with alcohol in your system you got counted. It didn't matter if you had a beer at dinner, had a BAC of .03 and got rear-ended sitting at a stop light by somebody that was stone sober. You still got counted as an alcohol-related traffic accident victim.
Substitute the word “Alcohol” for “Cannabis” and up the numbers and you can repeat it word for word.
Is there a test or a way to tell the difference between sativa and indica? New Years Eve I was at a party and had about five hits (first time in over a year) and I was a zombie for about two hours with a real rapid heart, after I came down a bit everything was cool. In the future I like to be able to tell the difference.
How about this deal, dont FORCE your Bullshit healthcare on me. I'll keep my tax money and choose what I want to do with myself.
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