Pubdate: Wed, 25 Jun 2014
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2014 The Washington Post Company
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/mUgeOPdZ
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491
Author: Ruth Marcus
Page: A19

A SCIENTIST'S VIEW OF POT MYTHS

 From her perch as head of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in
Bethesda, Nora Volkow watches anxiously as the country embarks on what
she sees as a risky social experiment in legalizing marijuana.

For those who argue that marijuana is no more dangerous than tobacco
and alcohol, Volkow has two main answers: We don't entirely know, and,
simultaneously, that is precisely the point.

"Look at the evidence," Volkow said in an interview on the National
Institutes of Health campus, pointing to the harms already inflicted
by tobacco and alcohol. "It's not subtle - it's huge. Legal drugs are
the main problem that we have in our country as it relates to
morbidity and mortality. By far. Many more people die of tobacco than
all of the drugs together. Many more people die of alcohol than all of
the illicit drugs together.

"And it's not because they are more dangerous or addictive. Not at all
- - they are less dangerous. It's because they are legal. ... The
legalization process generates a much greater exposure of people and
hence of negative consequences that will emerge. And that's why I
always say, ' Can we as a country afford to have a third legal drug?
Can we?' We know the costs already on health care, we know the costs
on accidents, on lost productivity. I let the numbers speak for
themselves."

Volkow speaks rapidly, even urgently, in an accent that lingers from
her childhood in Mexico. The great-granddaughter of Soviet communist
Leon Trotsky, Volkow grew up in the Mexico City home where Trotsky was
fatally attacked. It is easy to imagine, in her passionate
determination, some of her ancestor's revolutionary fervor, melded
with a scientist's evidentiary rigor.

As Colorado and Washington state approve the sale of marijuana for
recreational use and other states consider following suit, Volkow
says, the notion that legalization represents a modest, cost-free move
is dangerously overblown. The evidence on the supposed safety of
marijuana - particularly marijuana in its modern, far more potent form
- - is far from clear enough to take this leap.

"I think that what we are seeing is a little bit of wishful thinking
in the sense that we want to have a drug that will make us all feel
good and believe that there are no harmful consequences," she said.
"When you are intoxicated, your memory and learning are going to go
down. When you are intoxicated, your motor coordination is going to go
down. When you are repeatedly using marijuana, there is an increased
risk for addiction. And if you are an adolescent and you are taking
marijuana, there is a higher increased risk for addiction and there is
also a higher risk for long-lasting decreases in cognitive capacity -
that is, lowering of IQ."

Adolescents are a chief focus of Volkow's worry, to the extent that
when I observe that tobacco use is clearly worse for teens, she
challenges that easy assumption.

"Wait a second. . . . Nicotine does not interfere with cognitive
ability. So if you are an adolescent and you are smoking marijuana and
going to school, it's going to interfere with your capacity to learn.
So what is worse, as an adolescent right now? To have basically
something that is jeopardizing your development educationally or to
smoke a cigarette that, when you are 60 years of age, is going to lead
to impaired pulmonary function and perhaps cancer? ... I would argue
that you do not want to mess with your cognitive capacity, that that
is a very large price to pay."

Legalization advocates counter with two contradictory arguments: that
marijuana is already readily available to teenagers who want it, and
that the new laws impose strict controls on sales to minors. Volkow is
unconvinced, arguing that the evidence from alcohol suggests that the
already large number of teenagers who have tried marijuana by the time
they graduate from high school - nearly half, according to the Centers
for Disease Control and Prevention - will only increase, along with
the already rising number of those who use it on a daily basis.

"Our kids are sensitive to norms, so if they feel that marijuana is
harmful, their consumption goes down," Volkow said. Legalization sends
the opposite message.

Volkow herself has never smoked pot - or, as she tends to say, "taken
marijuana" - and she isn't tempted now that it is legally available in
some places. "I'm not going to negate that I am curious," she said.
"But I am terrified about doing anything that would interfere with my
cognitive capacity. ... I don't like to contaminate my perception of
the world. I have too much respect for my brain."
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MAP posted-by: Matt