|
Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
|
|
UN World Drug Report Warns: Cannabis Potency Now Comparable to That
Halifax Live, Canada
Wednesday 28 Jun 2006 UN World Drug Report Warns: Cannabis Potency Now Comparable to That of Cocaine and Heroin The 2006 United Nations World Drug Report was released on Monday and paints an alarming picture of the effects and increasing potency of marijuana. By far the world's most abused illicit drug, cannabis consumption has been increasing each year along with cannabis-related physical and mental health damage because of a higher potency than a few decades ago. The report advises nations that cannabis should no longer be labelled a soft and harmless drug and because of increasingly harmful characteristics of cannabis including hydroponic-produced cannabis, it is no longer any different from other plant-based drugs such as cocaine and heroin. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Executive Director Antonio Maria Costa warns that with cannabis-related health damage increasing along with mounting evidence that cannabis use can cause serious mental illness, "it is fundamentally wrong for countries to make cannabis control dependent on which party is in government." Costa cautions that government policy reversals are confusing to young people as to the actual dangers of the drug. Costa cautions if nations fail to follow coherent policies containing long-term strategies that reduce drug supply, demand and trafficking and refuse to "take the drug issue sufficiently seriously" many countries will be dealing with "the drug problem they deserve." The emergence of ‘new cannabis’ and the reassessment of health risks One of the first results of re-engineered cannabis resulted in a hybrid called skunk which contains higher levels of THC, the element which causes the high. The emergence of a more potent marijuana along with the re-emergence of an ancient cultivation technique that produced ‘sinsemilla’ using only unfertilized female flower heads or 'buds' of the marijuana plant has resulted in a very potent highgrade cannabis product. Highgrade cannabis contains 10.5% THC which compared to the lowgrade product of 2.5% THC is a much stronger drug. Along with improved breeding and the rediscovery of sinsemilla, indoor cultivation techniques using greenhouse technology and eventually cloning revoluntionized cannabis breeding and production which resulted in ‘seed banks’ that sell the product over the Internet, in competition with a growing number of rivals, in particular Canadian-based rivals. With so many people from so many different countries working extremely hard over the course of at least 20 years to develop more potent cannabis, the results of their endeavours can be seen in marijuana today that is anywhere from 10 to 30 to even 60 times stronger that the marijuana of the 1970s. Marijuana activists will vehemently deny that marijuana today is any stronger that the 1970s product but according to the UN World Drug Report, "The potency debate has generally hinged on measurements from police forensic testing. This information is collected for other purposes, not to create international comparable, time-series data." According to United States' Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and the Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), "cannabis-related emergency room admissions have increased, and have increased at a rate disproportionate to most other drugs of abuse." Increases in cannabis-related emergency room visits is the result of ingestion of high potency marijuana. High potency marijuana is also responsible for an increase in long-term treatment for dependencies and addictions to the drug. The 2006 UN report cautions that "few casual users of cannabis know that cannabis dependence is a major issue when they first start experimenting with the drug." Even more alarming is the UN World Drug Report on major physical and mental health issues as the result of marijuana ingestion. Cannabis has the ability to produce dysphoric reactions, including severe anxiety and panic, and paranoia leading to long-term psychological problems. "There is growing evidence that it can trigger latent psychosis and promote personality decompensation in diagnosed schizophrenics. Finally, some regular cannabis users find it difficult to stop using the drug, even when it is having adverse consequences for their lives." The complete 2006 UN World Drug Report can be found here: www.unodc.org/unodc/world_drug_report.html http://www.halifaxlive.com/content/view/782/2/
After you have finished reading this article you can click here to go back.
|
This page was created by the Cannabis Campaigners' Guide.
Feel free to link to this page!