Posted on 01/19/2004 10:04:33 PM PST by Dubya
A man of 36 is believed to have become the first person in Britain to die directly from cannabis poisoning.
Lee Maisey smoked six cannabis cigarettes a day for 11 years, an inquest heard. His death, which was registered as having been caused by cannabis toxicity, led to new warnings about the drug, which is due to be reclassified this month as a less dangerous one.
"This type of death is extremely rare," Prof John Henry, a toxicologist at Imperial College, London, said after the inquest at Haverfordwest, west Wales.
"I have not seen anything like this before. It corrects the argument that cannabis cannot kill anybody."
The inquest heard that Mr Maisey had complained of a headache on Aug 22 last year. Next morning he was found dead at the house he shared with a friend, Jeffrey Saunders, in Summerhill, Pembrokeshire.
Michael Howells, the Pembrokeshire coroner, said Mr Maisey was free from disease and had not drunk alcohol for at least 48 hours. Post-mortem tests showed a high level of cannabinoids in his blood.
He recorded a verdict of death by misadventure because Mr Maisey had died while taking part in an illegal activity. The death led to a warning about the changing strength of Dr Philip Guy, a lecturer in addictions at the University of Hull, said: "Cannabis is not the nice hippy drug it used to be. It has been experimented with to produce stronger varieties."
Dr Guy said that death was more likely if users ate the drug rather than smoked it. "I would not be surprised if in this case the deceased had ingested a fatal amount of cannabis."
Last autumn police issued a warning that big consignments of strong cannabis were being smuggled in from Africa. On Jan 29, cannabis will be reclassified from a class B to a class C drug.
The shadow home secretary, David Davis, said last night: "This highlights what we have been saying about the effects of cannabis all along. When will people wake up to the fact that cannabis can be a harmful drug?
"By reclassifying the drug David Blunkett has shown he has lost the war on drugs. In my eyes, it's nothing more than an admission of failure."
Tristan Millington-Drake, the chief executive of the Chemical Dependency Centre
Got the gist of the logic now?
Or a brewer or distiller who contributes heavily to political campaigns.
In today's world, is marijuana criminalization a good idea, and if so, why?
Billions of dollars on the line just on the legal side of the WoD. Trillions stand to be lost on the ILLEGAL side. Should those drugs ever become "legal", the entire bottom would fall out of their markets.
I don't care about all that.
I was just commenting on the amount of dope the guy was smoking- which was a lot.
No. Please go over **your** logic one more time. I understand the logic against legalizing drugs but your logic is very different.
OK, I'll ask a third time: Please post a few links to FR discussions where this is the main logic (this being "we need to stop them before they start having sex with colored jazz musicians") against pot.
I said nothing about sex with colored jazz musicians---that was jmc813. Now will you answer my question?
I don't. What is it?
Is signing up repeatedly to promote drugs after being banned a good idea, and if so, why?
They asphixiated 'em.
BWAAHAAAAA!!!
...OMG, now that's rich.
You have no logic at all. Just the irrational hate of an inanimate object and your desire to protect your socialist government programs. If you had an honest bone in your body you would be able to see the communist overtones to the WoD.
You don't, which makes any further attempts to change whatever mind you may possess entirely moot.
BWAAaaahhhhhh, HHHaaaaaa, Haaaaa, haaaa, haaaa.... OH! You crack me up! Lets see... I have an irrational hate! Hmmm your words: "socialist," "communist," "WoD."; Yes, there is some deep hatred going on here. You won't see it from me though!
If you want help with your drug problem there are plenty of places you can go. It's sad reading your angry posts toward people who don't want or need mind altering drugs. If only you didn't have this deep seeded need to escape reality...
Who's promoting drugs? Not me.
after being banned
What makes you think I've been banned?
And just as it is about to be reclassified as a less dangerous drug. Good timing. Just like the mass shootings here ocurring just before gun control legislation is about to be voted on.
In any event, I wonder just how thourough the autopsy was, and what the known lethal amount of cannabis in the blood is.
BTW, I oppose any drug use.
Of the reasons put forth for the Drug War, besides "drugs are bad", are the following.
1. Paternalistic attitude on the part of the drug warrior. Individuals are too stupid to run their own lives, so Big Government needs to do it for them. "People must be saved from themselves." kind of attitude. Despite the fact that our gene pool would be much cleaner if these defectives were allowed to "Darwin out".
2. Welfare/Medicare cost. The increase in social spending to support those so drugged out that they can no longer hold a job. Social programs in and of themselves are "communal" and collectivized. The VERY definition of "socialism". You bleeding heart communists just can't help but screaming "WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN????" They aren't MY children. I can afford to pay my insurance premiums (at least for now). If it wasn't for increase in taxes due to MORE social spending, I could probably afford to support more charities than I currently do.
3. Crime. What the hell did you expect after disarming most of the populace? Pumping up the cost of a substance so that 1000% returns on investment can be realized. Even supposedly "legal" substances like tobacco are now being "black marketed" because of prohibitory taxation.
It took a Constitutional Amendment to prohibit alcohol. There has been no such Amendment for the illegal War on Drugs. No matter how you wish to rationalize it.
Also, about the only "drug" I use is a good single malt scotch or an Irish Ale. Not that that matters to a commie like yourself.
"Hippies, they say they care about the environment but all they do is smoke pot and sing crappy songs" - Eric Cartman
Cartman: "I know. Drugs are bad because if you do drugs, you're a hippie. And hippies suck."
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