Bob McCoskrie: Canada - Booming sales of legalised marijuana linked to more car crashes and ED visits

Booming sales of legalised cannabis in Canada has led to booming numbers of car crashes and associated ED visits. In 2018, Canada became one of the first countries in the world to nationally legalise recreational cannabis. But the experiment isn’t going so well according to new research.

The research published in the Journal of American Medical Association found that after legalisation and commercialisation of cannabis, there was an increase of 223% in rates of cannabis-involved traffic injury ED visits compared to the pre-legalisation period.

Kate Hawkesby: Will calls for another cannabis referendum be taken seriously?

 

God bless the 20 year old Young Greens activist who wants a citizen initiated referendum on the decriminalisation of cannabis.

All he’s doing is highlighting how the government got this wrong first time round.

How much the pro lobby shot itself in the foot with its attempts to legalise? Mixed messaging, confusing misleading statements about medicinal, the advantage it would give big business, the smattering of weed shops around the country. It over shot the mark, went too far, and it didn’t convince enough New Zealanders to make it a reality.

It should've focused on decriminalisation not legalisation in the first place. It should have kept the messaging simple. But that’s all history now. The fact is, they lost.

Karl du Fresne: The lingering consquences of idealistic 60s liberalism

My generation has a lot to answer for. Recreational drugs, for example – or as former Wellington coroner Garry Evans preferred to call them, “wreckreational drugs”.

Mine was the generation that rebelled against the values of its parents. We were smug and spoilt, with plenty of time on our hands to reflect on how wrong our elders were about everything. We rejected their dreary, conformist moral values. “If it feels good, do it” became the catch-cry of a generation.

Muriel Newman: The Danger of Cannabis

As Professor Beasley explains, smoking cannabis is far more harmful to human health than smoking tobacco cigarettes. In terms of cancer risk, smoking one cannabis joint is the equivalent of smoking 20 cigarettes, and in terms of the risk of lung disease, smoking one cannabis joint is the equivalent of smoking up to 5 cigarettes.

Given the significant health and safety risks associated with cannabis use, why don’t our health officials and community leaders speak out more strongly about the dangers of this drug? Is their silence the reason that New Zealand has one of the highest reported rates of cannabis use in the world, with about three-quarters of the population having tried cannabis by the age of 25?

Why don’t the public service advertising campaigns that highlight the risk of lung cancer from smoking cigarettes warn young people of the dangers of smoking cannabis?

Richard Beasley: Cannabis and the lung

New Zealand has one of the highest reported rates of cannabis use, with about three-quarters of New Zealanders having tried cannabis by the age of 25, and nearly 10% cannabis-dependent by this age.

The potential adverse effects such as the dependence syndrome, impaired adolescent psychosocial development and mental health, and increased risk of motor vehicle crashes are well recognised.  

In contrast the potential for habitual cannabis smoking to cause adverse respiratory effects is less well recognised, in part because there has been less research undertaken in this field. In some respects this is surprising, as the usual way to take cannabis is by smoking, and it is known that cannabis smoke contains many of the same constituents as tobacco smoke, including higher levels of some carcinogens. 

Karl du Fresne: Gender, booze and drugs

ONE OF THE most interesting aspects of the recent upheaval in Australian politics was the way in which sexual politics intruded on media coverage.

High-profile female commentators such as Anne Summers and Kerry-Anne Walsh conspicuously lined up on the side of the deposed Julia Gillard. It was hard to avoid the conclusion that they saw Gillard’s overthrow by Kevin Rudd as part of a gender war.

Mike Butler: Greens leader backs Maori dope trade

Maori in regions where jobs are limited who are growing and selling cannabis to keep their whanau fed shouldn’t be punished for their entrepreneurship, Green Party co-leader Metiria Turei told Maori TV on Monday night. “It has become an income supplement for whanau particularly in rural areas where they have very little income and few job prospects, particularly in the back blocks, and we have to very careful how we manage that,” Turei said on the Native Affairs show.