A friend of mine is always pushing the positive health benefits of hemp oil for relieving chronic pain. I have been wary of these claims because of hemp oil’s relation to marijuana.
In this column, I’ll share with you my newly found education in the world of marijuana and hemp. I’ll start with Johnnie. He’s a high school student who occasionally does odd jobs for me, like running the Weed eater or sweeping the shop floor.
Since he isn’t old enough for a driver’s license, his father brings him over and I take him home after he completes his tasks. A couple of weeks ago he told me he didn’t need a ride home. His friend TJ would be picking him up.
During our conversation I learned that TJ is 18 and out of school. And on this particular day, TJ was running late. Johnnie called him to determine where he was. TJ said he was getting gas.
Then when he still hadn’t shown up, the story was that he got lost. And then he had a flat tire. An hour later, much to Johnnie’s disappointment, I told him I would take him home.
Later, I learned that TJ was chronically in trouble for smoking marijuana and using other drugs. I also got the message from Johnnie’s father that under no circumstances was his son permitted to associate with TJ.
So, after this, I did some online research about marijuana use by teenagers. The most informative reference I found was a summary of a speech recently delivered at Hillsdale College by Alex Berenson, author of the book Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence and a former investigative reporter for The New York Times. The summary was published in the January 2019 edition of Imprimis, the Hillsdale College speech digest.
This publication was my gateway to getting the lowdown, or perhaps the “high,” on marijuana. Here goes: There are two species of marijuana. Cannabis is the species that contains THC (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), the active ingredient that delivers marijuana’s high, which can lead to paranoia, and which often ends in violence.
And here’s something that really got my attention: Studies suggest that there is a three times greater chance of developing schizophrenia in those who used marijuana as a teenager.
Cannabidiol (CBD) oil, derived from hemp, is a marijuana “kissing cousin.” It contains virtually no THC. It is legal in all 50 states. As a matter of fact, hemp and CBD are covered under the federal crop insurance program, a part of the approved 2018 farm bill.
CBD has some mild medicinal properties for pain relief and anxiety relief, but hasn’t been put through controlled trials comparing it to ibuprofen, aspirin, other analgesics or Prozac. How good is it? I don’t know. Some friends of mine swear by it. Some soldiers suffering from PTSD swear by it.
On the other hand, cannabis is what users get high on. In the old days typical marijuana plants contained about 2% THC. Today, thanks to precision farming practices, marijuana contains about 20 to 25% THC. Talk about smoking or eating something with some kick! Not that I have any experience. I imagine it’s like comparing the potency of a beer to the kick of Smirnoff’s vodka (GMO-free, of course).
About 11% of emergency room psychosis cases are caused by cannabis, according to Berenson1. That amounts to more than 90,000 cases, or 250 a day – triple the caseload of 2006. Experts have challenged these numbers, because there aren’t good controls for tabulating the statistics.
However, health authorities In Finland and Denmark track mental illness very precisely. These countries report a significant increase in psychosis since the legal introduction of marijuana.
For all of you mature readers, this harkens back to the early days when the rumble was that cigarettes caused cancer. Then, scientists were divided because the data was relatively new and tobacco companies spent millions to prevent dissemination of negative information.
In the case of marijuana, a host of entrepreneurs are lining up to capture huge profits. And opportunistic state governments see a new source of revenue coming their way. How could the vultures go wrong?
Veterinarians have been seeing the effects in their patients. The American Veterinary Medical Association reports that cannabis toxicity cases in dogs and cats are increasing exponentially.
Pet owners seldom consider the fact that the dose of cannabis in a brownie for a 150-pound human is 10 times by weight the dose that a 15- to 20-pound pet may be able to metabolize.
And strangely enough, there have been discussions about using marijuana in cows. If it were put in cow feed, I can imagine a new problem: farm employees wanting to “supervise” the cow feed bunk. Another thought: labeling milk jugs with “milk from marijuana-contented cows” could increase milk sales!
If you want to do your own research, contact the publisher of this publication for the bibliography of resources I used to write this column.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
- https://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/marijuana-mental-illness-violence/
- https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/there-link-between-marijuana-use-psychiatric-disorders (this link is no longer available)
- http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/conditions/risky-business-marijuana-use (this link is no longer available)
- https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/March-2018/Substance-Use-Carries-Mental-Health-Risks—Yes-Even Marijuana
- (This link has been removed from the Treatment Advocacy Center's site) https://www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org/fixing-the-system/features-and-news/4092-research-weekly-cannabis-and-serious-mental-illness-part-one-medical-marijuana
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2811144/
- (This link has been removed from the agweb site) https://www.agweb.com/article/five-fast-facts-about-cannabis-/
- (This link has been removed from the agweb site) https://www.agweb.com/article/hemp-milk-dairys-new-plant-based-threat/?mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWWprMk16STRNak01TnpjNSIsInQiOiIzNmRaVkluTzRtZXlyb0o1RHppSkJLeVVFc3lJSnAzZElCQjJBUnhVV2ZyZzBcLzk3ejdDUGo3bUQzQTJCXC83UHliUVBESmE4dVJyemtLSFEwTFZQUitYR1wvWTlGZ0VjQTB2bjdQQVFEZFBYeEwrUWxZZEZST1NDXC9mbUFwVktCZDcifQ%3D%3D
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