Pot-related poison control calls up in Washington, Colorado

There I go with those pesky ‘facts’ again. ;-)

And if you ever post any facts, I'll tell you.

I finally checked out the source you posted. The source is a question-and-answer board from 2012, and the quoted "science" is from a DEA judge in 1988.

a. This is hardly a scientific source.

b. They really do quote ".9 grams". Other sources go as high as 1.2 grams for a cigarette, so at least this number is in the ballpark.

c. So, using the .9 gram base makes the death dose median 59.4 pounds as I calculated above. Not 1500 pounds.

d. According to one source, THC content of marijuana has increased 2.5 times from 1988 to 2009. Based on your source lethality factor (which I don't accept, by the way), this recalculates the death dose median as 23.8 pounds.

e. And finally, 79 potheads posted hi-larious Cheech-n-Chong style idiocy on your 2012 source, and not one of them mentioned the faulty math.

If you really did go to the link that I posted, you’d see that I didn’t do the math. I posted a quote from the article.

Second, I suggested that others look up ‘lethal dose for marijuana’ and do the research for themselves.

Part of the problem with the question is that nobody’s ever found the lethal dose. Even with animal models. Once you get the smoke level high enough, there’s no oxygen in the room and it really does appear that it’s the lack of oxygen that’s causing reported damage, not cannabis.

I am fully confident that, one day, a male (aged 17-24) will figure out a way to concentrate cannabis and ingest it in order to get a lethal dose. (Young men tend to take words like ‘can’t’ and turn it into a challenge.) But, if scientists’ are correct, it will take Herculean efforts to do so.

Do the research for yourself. Your own math shows that it would take an unrealistic amount of cannabis, consumed in an unrealistic time-frame, to kill yourself with cannabis.

Then compare rates of marijuana deaths/overdoses/accidents with the same *daily* rates of alcohol. Heck, feel free to gather all of the data on cannabis from the last 3,500 years that we’ve been using it and compare it to the daily damage by alcohol.

Can the drug be abused? Of course. Anything can. But the harms of cannabis are less than swimming pools, vending machines, and wet tile.

Until five days ago, I had never touched the stuff. I was a drug warrior and proud of it.

But the medications that I’m prescribed are starting to take their toll and I had to find another way to deal with the daily pain.

As of yesterday, I’m off:

- muscle relaxants
- all OTC medications
- 50% reduction in opiate use
- 33% reduction of benzos

And I’m more comfortable. I haven’t been able to break through that wall of pain medications after a year of trying on my own. Within 5 days, I’m well on my way to getting out. Heck, just by eliminating the hand-fulls of OTC meds, my life expectancy has gone up.

I’m not taking enough to get ‘high’. I keep it just below the edge of that and just enough to help with the pain. As with opiates, I am not abusing. Cannabis is much less harmful than my combined prescribed medications and coping mechanisms.

So while you’re educating yourself (like a thinking Conservative, instead of reacting to slogans like a brain-dead Leftist) why don’t you look into the scientific research/studies that show the benefits of cannabis? Not the snake-oil testimonials, but the actual science behind the benefits and the reasons for those benefits.

I’m glad you’re doing better. If opiates can be used in medicine, then I never understood the reluctance of the establishment, until recently, to use marijuana.

However, that does not promote the general legalization of the product. Having grown up in a generation where use was rampant, I saw the harm with my own eyes. I find fanboys pushing the “harmless” lie to be odious. Legalization in Washington has led to more problems with the product. Saying it does less damage than alcohol is poor salve for the people killed in several recent driving while high accidents.

You’re saying that the craft-brewers’ love of their brew doesn’t excuse people who’ve killed with DUI’s.

Sure.

I agree with you that one doesn’t excuse the irresponsibility of the other, but you must admit that the harm to the USER is much less with cannabis than with alcohol. (If you’ve done ANY research at all, that is.)

Both can impair the individual. But nobody’s died of a cannabis OD and many die of alcohol ODs every year.

Look up ‘harm reduction’ and how it’s done wonders to reduce drug use and to reduce crime where it’s been implemented.

If we’re trying to reduce HARM (to both the user, their families and the general public), then we do need to legalize cannabis. Cannabis *is* a gateway drug... away from more harmful medications. In my first visit to a dispensary I met two individuals who had gotten off of opiates with the help of cannabis while in the waiting room. I’ve met die-hard alcoholics who’d gotten off of booze with cannabis and developed productive lives.

I’m not saying that this can’t be abused or that there is zero harm from the product. I’m saying that the harm is minimal and that the benefits should be considered.

What if legalizing cannabis would reduce opiate deaths by 50%? Would you see the benefit then? What if DUIs from alcohol reduced by 25%? (and cannabis went up by 5%)? Wouldn’t it be better to bring the OVERALL death rate down?

What if more people were allowed to leave disability and have the strength to earn their own living? Would that not be worth the price of legalization?

Oh! What if we could end no-knock warrants, a militarized police force, and the cartel’s grip on our country? Is that not harm reduction?

There are so many facets to this diamond that it’s impossible to take it all into account. Overall, the war against cannabis is worse than the plant.

Just let it go, already.

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