After states pass laws permitting medical marijuana, drivers in those states become less likely to test positive for opioids after fatal car accidents, a new study from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health has found. Researchers analyzed federal crash data in 18 states over the period from 1999 to 2013. States that passed a…
While research into health benefits of cannabis has zipped along thanks in part to the local culture of ‘protekzia,’ a pioneer in the field says hundreds of uses of the plant are waiting to be discovered, and a marketer wants to slip it into milk so everyone can have a daily dose As hundreds of…
Marijuana abuse and dependency are becoming less common, even as states roll back restrictions on the use of the drug, according to a new federal report. In 2014, the number of Americans aged 12 and over meeting diagnostic criteria for marijuana abuse or dependency stood at 1.6 percent, a decline from 1.8 percent in 2002, according…
Today, in a 4 to 1 vote, Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled that the prohibition of the consumption and cultivation of marijuana for personal use is unconstitutional. The Court determined that the prohibition of the consumption of marijuana – and its cultivation for non-commercial ends – violates the human right to the free development of one’s…
Jul 29, 2016 Gov. Bruce Rauner Signs Illinois Marijuana Decriminalization Bill Into Law Illinois is now the 21st state in the nation to remove the threat of jail time for simple marijuana possession; possession of a personal amount is now considered a civil violation punishable by a fine of $100-$200, similar to a traffic ticket…
Reporting from WASHINGTON — Tucked deep inside the 1,603-page federal spending measure is a provision that effectively ends the federal government’s prohibition on medical marijuana and signals a major shift in drug policy. The bill’s passage over the weekend marks the first time Congress has approved nationally significant legislation backed by legalization advocates. It brings almost…
It must have been something in the air. During a short time window at the end of the last ice age, Stone Age humans in Europe and Asia independently began using a new plant: cannabis. That’s the conclusion of a review of cannabis archaeology, which also links an intensification of cannabis use in East Asia…
Rates of marijuana use among Colorado’s teenagers are essentially unchanged in the years since the state’s voters legalized marijuana in 2012, new survey data from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment shows. In 2015, 21 percent of Colorado youths had used marijuana in the past 30 days. That rate is slightly lower than the national…
“Cannabis brings us an awareness that we spend a lifetime being trained to overlook and forget and put out of our minds.” — Carl Sagan Most of us remember Carl Sagan as a brilliant scientist, a popularizer of both the methods and progress of human knowledge. Some know him as an advocate of space exploration…
Dan Baum, writing in support of drug legalization at Harper’s, has unleashed a frank 1994 quote from former Nixon policy advisor John Ehrlichman, and as inadvertently salient an argument for legalizing drugs as any I’ve ever seen: At the time, I was writing a book about the politics of drug prohibition. I started to ask…
