youth

An analysis of survey data from more than 280,000 young adults ages 18-35 showed that cannabis (marijuana) use was associated with increased risks of thoughts of suicide (suicidal ideation), suicide plan, and suicide attempt. These associations remained regardless of whether someone was also experiencing depression, and the risks were greater for women than for men.
“Suicide is a leading cause of death among young adults in the United States, and the findings of this study offer important information that may help us reduce this risk,”

Marijuana concentrates such as shatter, butter or glass have THC concentrations as high as 90 percent. The same high levels are found in edible cannabis products sold in Colorado, packaged to look like popular candy bars and particularly appealing to children.
And despite the perception that marijuana is not addictive the way opiates or nicotine are, Potee said that 17 percent of those who start using it as adolescents develop addiction. For teens who use marijuana every day, the addiction rate is 30 to 50 percent.

From 2005 to 2015, 4,202 marijuana-related visits were identified. Behavioral health evaluation was obtained for 2,813 (67%); a psychiatric diagnosis was made for the majority (71%) of these visits. Coingestants were common; the most common was ethanol (12%). Marijuana-related visits increased from 1.8 per 1,000 visits in 2009 to 4.9 in 2015. (p = < .0001) CONCLUSIONS: Despite national survey data suggesting no appreciable difference in adolescent marijuana use, our data demonstrate a significant increase in adolescent marijuana-associated emergency department and urgent cares visits in Colorado.

This study found that chronic marijuana use in adolescence was negatively associated with achieving important developmental milestones in young adulthood.

KNOW YOUR A,B,C,D’s   …  Absent, Behavior, Course Grade = Drugs
 

"The rapid growth in concentrates and edibles is the continuation of a two-year trend, as consumers increasingly prefer alternative consumption methods to smoking," BDS Analytics CEO Roy Bingham told Civilized in an e-mail. 
Also, increased are hospitalization, ER visits and vehicle fatal accidents. 

Warsame told his schoolmate he had never smoked marijuana and would like to try it, and the two smoked together, according to the report.

A toxicology screen by the medical examiner found “relatively high levels”  of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main psychoactive constituent in marijuana, in Warsame’s system.

In summary, marijuana use is harmful to children and adolescents.  For this reason, the American College of Pediatricians opposes its legalization for recreational use and urges extreme caution in legalizing it for medicinal use.  Likewise, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) recently offered their own policy statement opposing efforts to legalize marijuana. They similarly pointed out that “marijuana’s deleterious effects on adolescent brain development, cognition, and social functioning may have immediate and long-term implications, including increased risk of motor vehicle accidents, sexual victimization, academic failure, lasting decline in intelligence measures, psychopathology, addiction, and psychosocial and occupational impairment.” Thus the AACAP (a) opposes efforts to legalize marijuana, (b) supports initiatives to increase awareness of marijuana’s harmful effects on adolescents, (c) supports improved access to evidence-based treatment, rather than emphasis on criminal charges, for adolescents with cannabis use disorder, and (d) supports careful monitoring of the effects of marijuana-related policy changes on child and adolescent mental health.⁴⁹ The College agrees with this position on marijuana.

January 2016 Update:
YOUTH USAGE: 
• In the two year average (2013/2014) since Colorado legalized recreational marijuana, youth past month marijuana use increased 20 percent compared to the two year average prior to legalization (2011/2012). o Nationally youth past month marijuana use declined 4 percent during the same time.
• The latest 2013/2014 results show Colorado youth ranked #1 in the nation for past month marijuana use, up from #4 in 2011/2012.
COLLEGE USAGE:
•Colorado college age past month marijuana use for 2013/2014 was 62 percent higher than the national average
ADULT USAGE:
•The latest 2013/2014 results show Colorado adults ranked #1 in the nation for past month marijuana use, up from #7 in 2011/2012.
• Colorado adult past month marijuana use for 2013/2014 was 104 percent higher than the national average compared to 51 percent higher in 2011/2012.

Levy says. “We are simply not prepared for the fallout of marijuana legalization.”
Each hit of THC rewires the function of this critical cognitive system: Early evidence in mice has shown that repeated exposure to THC causes these receptors to disappear altogether, blunting the natural response to positive behaviors and requiring higher doses to achieve the same effect. Marijuana exploits essential pathways we’ve evolved to retrieve a memory, to delicately regulate our metabolism, and to derive happiness from everyday life.

Given these statistics.... is legalization worth the consequences....
Cannabis has been found to be the most frequently used drug in the U.S. after alcohol, tobacco and caffeine. 
The risk of developing addiction associated with cannabis use has been reported to increase to about 17% among those who start using marijuana in adolescence, and to 25-50% among those who smoke marijuana daily.
The long-term effects of marijuana use include altered brain development and cognitive impairment, including impaired neural connectivity in specific brain regions, decreased activity in prefrontal regions, and reduced volumes in the hippocampus.
Cannabis is most commonly consumed through smoking, a route of drug delivery that predictably has a variety of negative effects on pulmonary function. Smoke from marijuana combustion has been shown to contain a number of carcinogens and cocarcinogens, as well as many of the toxins, irritants, and carcinogens as tobacco smoke.  Additionally, marijuana smokers tend to inhale more deeply and hold their breath longer than cigarette smokers, which leads to a greater exposure per breath to “tar” (the carcinogenic solids in smoke). Regular smoking of marijuana, in the absence of tobacco, produces visible and microscopic injury to the large airways
http://www.asam.org/docs/default-source/publicy-policy-statements/mariju...

The commonly heard expression that “no one ever died from a marijuana overdose” minimizes the cost of unmet potential and inability to fully engage in the challenges of daily life. Scientific research cites multiple impacts of the recreational misuse of marijuana.

Rates of vaporizing cannabis using e-cigarettes were high. These findings raise concerns about the lack of e-cigarette regulations and the potential use of e-cigarettes for purposes other than vaping nicotine.

In summary, marijuana use is harmful to children and adolescents.  For this reason, the American College of Pediatricians opposes its legalization for recreational use and urges extreme caution in legalizing it for medicinal use.  Likewise, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) recently offered their own policy statement opposing efforts to legalize marijuana. They similarly pointed out that “marijuana’s deleterious effects on adolescent brain development, cognition, and social functioning may have immediate and long-term implications, including increased risk of motor vehicle accidents, sexual victimization, academic failure, lasting decline in intelligence measures, psychopathology, addiction, and psychosocial and occupational impairment.” 

Marijuana use by kids between the ages of 12 and 17 is 58 percent higher in Colorado than the national average, according to the RHMIDTA. The rate of use among college-age adults is 54 percent above the national average. Drug-related suspensions from Colorado schools jumped 34 percent from the 2005-2009 period to the 2010-2014 period, while alcohol-related suspensions stayed flat.
 "Everything they said would happen has not," says Gorman. "They said alcohol use would go down. Alcohol use went up. They said it would eliminate the (marijuana) black market. We are the black market. The trends show that legalization is not working."
 

Our findings, consistent with previous evidence, suggest that passage of state medical marijuana laws does not increase adolescent use of marijuana. However, overall, adolescent use is higher in states that ever passed such a law than in other states. State-level risk factors other than medical marijuana laws could contribute to both marijuana use and the passage of medical marijuana laws, and such factors warrant investigation.

Finally, from a public health standpoint, it is crucial that we begin to address regulatory standards for this industry given that it is in the early stages; we have a unique opportunity to shape the industry practices as legislation continues to evolve. This could help decrease potentially numerous problems similar to those that have occurred with both alcohol and tobacco advertising.

Bertha Madras speak on the evidence that pot is not a medicine.  

The raw cannabis plant has no medicinal value. For the same reasons people no longer chew bark to cure headaches but instead buy aspirin, there is no medical reason to smoke pot. The pharmaceutical profession exists to isolate active medical ingredients from herbs and plants (or synthesize them) and to provide safe, standardized doses with minimal side effects. This is how every other drug works. There is no scientific or medical reason to make marijuana an exception.

·        These consequences include impaired short-term memory and decreased concentration, attention span, and problem solving, which clearly interfere with learning. Alterations in motor control, coordination, judgment, reaction time, and tracking ability have also been documented; these may contribute to unintentional deaths and injuries among adolescents (especially those associated with motor vehicles if adolescents drive while intoxicated by marijuana).
·        Negative health effects on lung function associated with smoking marijuana have also been documented, and studies linking marijuana use with higher rates of psychosis in patients with a predisposition to schizophrenia have recently been published, raising concerns about longer-term psychiatric effects. New research has also demonstrated that the adolescent brain, particularly the prefrontal cortex areas controlling judgment and decision-making, is not fully developed until the mid-20s, raising questions about how any substance use may affect the developing brain. Research has shown that the younger an adolescent begins using drugs, including marijuana, the more likely it is that drug dependence or addiction will develop in adulthood.
·         A recent analysis of 4 large epidemiologic trials found that marijuana use during adolescence is associated with reductions in the odds of high school completion and degree attainment and increases in the use of other illicit drugs and suicide attempts in a dose-dependent fashion that suggests that marijuana use is causative.

Monitoring the Future is an ongoing study of the behaviors, attitudes, and values of American secondary school students, college students, and young adults.

Medical cannabinoids are here to stay, but intellectual honesty is imperative if we are moving toward exploiting their potential benefits. Owing to rising THC concentrations of products, "medical" marijuana is rarely good medicine. This review has identified the dangers associated with whole­plant marijuana, whether used for recreational or for supposedly medical purposes.

These results provide empirical evidence to support concerns that decriminalization may be a risk factor for future increases in youth marijuana use and acceptance.

Appendix

Changes in Marijuana Use Patterns, Systematic Literature Review, and Possible Marijuana-Related Health Effects

• 1 in 3 users are daily users
• Black adults in Colorado are using at almost 50% higher than the state average for adults; Hispanics have the lowest use rates
• Low income Colorado adults are using at higher rates than the state average
• Almost a third of 18-24 year olds are using marijuana
• Almost a third of gay and lesbian adults are using marijuana - more than twice the state average for adults
• Almost 1 in five reported driving after using marijuana

The large meta-analysis – a study of combined previous research – showed that people who are daily users of cannabis before the age of 17 are more than 60 per cent less likely to complete secondary school or to complete a degree compared with those who have never used the drug.

Teenagers who smoke marijuana daily are over 60 percent less likely to complete high school than those who never use. They're also 60 percent less likely to graduate college and seven times more likely to attempt suicide.

One such statistic is a spike in calls to poison control centers. According to the National Poison Data System, calls about accidental ingestion of marijuana in children 9 and younger more than tripled in states that decriminalized marijuana before 2005. In states that enacted legalization from 2005 to 2011, calls increased nearly 11.5 percent per year. Over the same period in states without decriminalization laws, the call rate stayed the same.

The scientists focus on marijuana’s harmful effects on teens, an age group in which the brain rapidly develops, which is one factor that could help explain increased risks from marijuana use in this population. Research suggests that marijuana impairs critical thinking and memory functions during use and that these deficits persist for days after using. 

The damaging effects remain even if the person stops smoking the drug
·         Teenagers are at particular risk because their brains are still developing
·         Smoking cannabis affects critical thinking and memory
·         Researchers warn that stronger varieties today are causing more damage 

Because regulatory standards of the production process vary by state, the composition, purity, and concentration of the active constituents of marijuana are also likely to vary. This is especially problematic because unlike most other prescription medications that are single active compounds, marijuana contains more than 100 cannabinoids, terpenoids, and flavonoids that produce individual, interactive, and entourage effects.

No other prescription medication is smoked; concerns remain about the long-term risks of respiratory problems associated with smoking marijuana, which are a subject of active investigation.
5 THCis already available in a pill approved by the FDA, yet this form seems to be less desirable to those seeking medical marijuana; this may in part be because its euphoric effects are not immediate and cannot be reliably controlled, unlike smoked marijuana. 6

The current system of dispensing marijuana does not safeguard adequately against the potential for diversion and abuse.

This article focuses on cannabis' medicinal and recreational aspects.

Cannabis, the plant, contains over 400 chemicals, including a penicillin-like antibiotic, cannabidiolic acid. The Cannabis plants' chemical derivatives can be used for either recreational or therapeutic (medicinal) purposes.