Pubdate: Wed, 30 Nov 2011
Source: Denver Post (CO)
Copyright: 2011 The Denver Post Corp
Contact:  http://www.denverpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122
Author: John Ingold
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?224 (Cannabis and Driving)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Cannabis - Medicinal)

REPORT SHOWS FEWER TRAFFIC FATALITIES AFTER STATES PASS MEDICAL-POT LAWS

The passage of state medical-marijuana laws is associated with a 
subsequent drop in the rate of traffic fatalities, according to a 
newly released study by two university professors.

The study - by University of Colorado Denver professor Daniel Rees 
and Montana State University professor D. Mark Anderson - found that 
the traffic-death rate drops by nearly 9 percent in states after they 
legalize marijuana for medical use. The researchers arrived at that 
figure, Rees said, after controlling for other variables such as 
changes in traffic laws, seat-belt usage and miles driven. The study 
stops short of saying the medical-marijuana laws cause the drop in 
traffic deaths.

"We were pretty surprised that they went down," Rees said Tuesday.

The study was posted this month on the website of the Bonn, Germany- 
based Institute for the Study of Labor and has not yet been peer-reviewed.

Rees said the main reason for the drop appears to be that 
medical-marijuana laws mean young people spend less time drinking and 
more time smoking cannabis. Legalization of medical marijuana, the 
researchers report, is associated with a 12-percent drop in the 
alcohol-related fatal-crash rate and a 19-percent decrease in the 
fatality rate of people in their 20s, according to the study.

The study also found that medical-marijuana legalization is 
associated with a drop in beer sales.

"The result that comes through again and again and again is (that) 
young adults . . . drink less when marijuana is legalized and traffic 
fatalities go down," Rees said.

The study is sure to add fuel to a debate over the impacts of 
Colorado's medical-marijuana boom on traffic safety, which has 
embroiled cannabis advocates and law enforcement officials for more 
than a year.

The state legislature this year rejected a bill that would have set a 
threshold of THC - the psychoactive chemical in marijuana - that 
would qualify someone as too stoned to drive. After more research and 
a fractious debate, the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile 
Justice will not recommend that the legislature try again with such a 
bill this year.

"The working group was not able to come to consensus," said Arapahoe 
County Sheriff Grayson Robinson, who led the subcommittee that 
studied the issue.

Much of that debate has focused on marijuana's impact on an 
individual's driving abilities. Rees and Anderson say their study 
does not mean it is safer to drive stoned than drunk. Instead, they 
write, increased medical-marijuana usage at home might change 
patterns of substance use and driving.

Mason Tvert, the head of the pro-marijuana-legalization group SAFER, 
said the study suggests legalizing marijuana would be beneficial in 
unexpected ways.

"People who are drinking drive faster, take more risks, underestimate 
how impaired they are," he said.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom