Opinion

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News / Opinion / Columns

Donnelly: Liberalizing pot laws threatens mental health

By Ann Donnelly

Published: June 1, 2024, 6:01am

Election-year proposals to liberalize marijuana laws aim to entice support from young voters. Yet greater latitude for growing, selling and consuming pot, and downplaying its dangers, would seriously harm young people and our communities.

The Legislature, in its 2023-2024 session, considered a marijuana home cultivation measure that would have allowed adults to grow up to four plants per person. It died due to bipartisan concerns about the unintended consequences of pot growing in homes.

At the federal level, President Joe Biden, in his State of the Union speech, proposed reclassifying marijuana as a “less-dangerous drug.” His own Drug Enforcement Administration was ignored in announcing his proposal to move marijuana from a Schedule I drug (heroin and LSD) to Schedule III (ketamine).

A common assertion is that pot is no more dangerous than alcohol. Especially with more potent cannabis, the comparison is dangerously misleading. Steadfastly ignored by liberalization proponents is the scientific evidence that increased pot consumption exacerbates the mental health crisis.

The THC in cannabis, researchers explain, binds to receptors in the brain controlling memory, decision-making and self-control. “Research shows that high-frequency users are more likely to become addicted to marijuana,” said Dr. David A. Gorelick, professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “High-frequency use also increases the risk of developing cannabis-associated psychosis.” The Center for Disease Control states that “marijuana use is associated with depression; social anxiety, and thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts, and suicide.”

Writing in Newsweek (May 22), Dr. Kevin Sabet, former three-time White House drug policy advisor, states “daily users of marijuana above 10 percent THC are nearly five times more likely to develop a psychotic disorder than non-users. … A 2022 study found that hospital discharges for marijuana-associated psychosis were higher in states with legal marijuana.”

Cannabis-involved ER visits among children quadrupled between early 2019 and 2022 (Wall Street Journal, Jan. 22).

Nikolas Cruz, at his sentencing in 2021 for the Parkland, Fla., school shooting, identified marijuana as an element in his violent psychotic episode: “I hate drugs and I believe this country would do better if everyone would stop smoking marijuana and doing all these drugs and causing racism and violence out in the streets.”

Associated public safety impacts include homelessness, truancy, crime, traffic fatalities and child deaths linked to marijuana. Parents Opposed to Pot reports 312 such child deaths from 2012 to 2024, caused by: “violence, fires, drowning, hot car, violent neglect, or neglect/exposure/suffocation.”

In Washington, traffic fatalities are at a 33-year high, of which roughly 50 percent involve drug or alcohol impairment. As of 2023, workers are cheating on drug tests at the highest rate in 30 years (Quest Diagnostics, in Wall Street Journal, May 16), implying they may be driving while impaired.

Liberalization measures would likely expand pot use. Oregon’s failed experiment with decriminalization underscores the unintended impacts of going easy on drug users. Legalization itself has exponentially expanded pot consumption, according to research at Carnegie Mellon University.

“For the first time, the number of Americans who use marijuana just about every day has surpassed the number who drink that often, a shift some 40 years in the making. … From 1992 to 2022, the per capita rate of reporting daily or near-daily marijuana use increased 15-fold” (Associated Press and The Columbian, May 22).

We must acknowledge the science. Continuing to liberalize pot laws comes at a steep price that far outweighs possible benefits.

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