Here's How Many People Fatally Overdosed On Marijuana Last Year

[slimvictor]

^ we did talk about assigning responsibility above.

If I eat a weed brownie and get so high that I think I can drive, but end up killing myself (and maybe others), is the weed to blame?

Without it, I would not be dead. Blame the weed!
Yet others ate similar brownies and didn't kill anyone. Don't blame the weed!
My bad judgment is to blame.
But without weed, I would not have made the same judgment! Blame the weed!
But I chose to ingest the weed, so it's my conscious decision that is to blame. Don't blame the weed!
But nothing is my fault - my parents decided to have a child!
But they were high when they did so! Blame the weed!
(repeat ad nauseum)

The discussion is potentially endless, and there is no easy way to come to an agreed-upon conclusion.
There are two distinct ways to see it.
1) Does the drug use lead to the death directly, physically?
2) Does the drug use lead to the death less directly, by making the user so mentally fucked up that they believe bizarre shit and die while mentally living in the world of those hallucinations?

However, the dividing line between these two is not always absolutely clear.
Both lead to death through a series of biochemical reactions.
So you could see them as the same thing, in a way.
And, someone could have e.g. a weak heart, which makes it easier to die from a heart attack "caused by" e.g. crack, but clarifying and assigning responsibility to the crack vs. the pre-existing condition seems difficult.
In the same way, someone can have a susceptibility to a mental condition that is brought on by a drug.
So the picture is far from clear - both in terms of dividing between 1 and 2, and, even if we can do this, in terms of assigning responsibility to the drug vs. situational factors.

But if we try to maintain a distinction, we could say that it is likely that weed only extremely rarely kills people as in 1 above - heart rate was mentioned, and there must be a few cases of heart attacks I assume - but relatively more often kills people as in 2 above - especially with edibles, though even with smoking, people can freak out, have psychotic episodes, etc.

 

[Mycophile]

I COMPLETELY disagree that the "dividing line between the two is not clear".

In terms of plain science, no other mind altering drug I can think of has as almost IMPOSSIBLY high an LD50 (overdose thresh hold for a HEALTHY user) as Weed:

Here's some info on that:

"The estimated LD-50 (lethal threshold) for marijuana,established in 1988 by the DEA’s appropriate fact-finder, is 1:20,000 or 1:40,000.Quote:“At present it is estimated that marijuana’s LD-50 is around1:20,000 or 1:40,000. In layman terms this means that in order to induce death a marijuana smoker would have to consume 20,000 to 40,000 times as much marijuana as is contained in one marijuana cigarette. NIDA-supplied marijuana cigarettes weigh approximately .9 grams. A smoker would theoretically have to consume nearly 1,500 pounds of marijuana within about fifteen minutes to induce a lethal response."

So there you have.It's not possible for a healthy person to have a clear cut overdose from ONLY marijuanna with no prior health conditions.

If we look up alcohol or benzos or opiates or coke or meth or almost any other mind altering substances they all have clear cut LD50s for the most part that are possible to achieve, usually even WITHOUT trying to kill yourself.

All of them EXCEPT for weed.

All kinds of things that aren't drugs can be factors in deaths, but where the activity itself is not inherently dangerous.

If a person with a heart condition does all sorts of things that would be fine for a healthy person they can die, like going for a run, having sex, watching a scary movie, etc.But none would ever be considered the TRUE cause of death as in a heroin or alcohol overdose , just a potentiating factor.

The line is VERY VERY clear between the two.

Couldn't possibly be clearer IMO.​

 

[slimvictor]

I COMPLETELY disagree that the "dividing line between the two is not clear".

In terms of plain science, no other mind altering drug I can think of has as almost IMPOSSIBLY high an LD50 (overdose thresh hold for a HEALTHY user) as Weed:

Here's some info on that:

"The estimated LD-50 (lethal threshold) for marijuana,established in 1988 by the DEA’s appropriate fact-finder, is 1:20,000 or 1:40,000.Quote:“At present it is estimated that marijuana’s LD-50 is around1:20,000 or 1:40,000. In layman terms this means that in order to induce death a marijuana smoker would have to consume 20,000 to 40,000 times as much marijuana as is contained in one marijuana cigarette. NIDA-supplied marijuana cigarettes weigh approximately .9 grams. A smoker would theoretically have to consume nearly 1,500 pounds of marijuana within about fifteen minutes to induce a lethal response."

So there you have.It's not possible for a healthy person to have a clear cut overdose from ONLY marijuanna with no prior health conditions.

If we look up alcohol or benzos or opiates or coke or meth or almost any other mind altering substances they all have clear cut LD50s for the most part that are possible to achieve, usually even WITHOUT trying to kill yourself.

All of them EXCEPT for weed.

All kinds of things that aren't drugs can be factors in deaths, but where the activity itself is not inherently dangerous.

If a person with a heart condition does all sorts of things that would be fine for a healthy person they can die, like going for a run, having sex, watching a scary movie, etc.But none would ever be considered the TRUE cause of death as in a heroin or alcohol overdose , just a potentiating factor.

The line is VERY VERY clear between the two.

Couldn't possibly be clearer IMO.​

Let me start by saying that I am a huge fan of cannabis, so I am not trying to make it sound bad because I have some ulterior purpose. My only purpose is harm reduction and accurate dissemination of information. So, when I criticize your post below, it is not personal, but only in the interest of serving these purposes. I have no other agenda.

On the other hand, I wonder if you have an agenda.
Like, other than harm reduction. Like, you are trying to "stick up" for weed, not just discuss the issues in an impartial way.
Your conclusion, which I highlighted in red, suggests that you do/did, and that you forgot about harm reduction or were not aware that this is the purpose of Bluelight, or maybe that you simply didn't know that your post does not help this purpose, and even hurts it.
I would say that what you said is fairly dangerous misinformation.

Here is how to spread such misinformation.
First, cite some numbers and statistics.
Say that you are appealing to "plain science" (as if there were another type of science).
Then, use a term ("overdose") in a way that can be ambiguous and make a grand, boldly conclusive generalization of a statement that is supposedly "supported" by the numbers.
For this, you would be better off in politics, where the approach seems to be very successful, instead of BL.

One problem is that some people may read through your post and decide that cannabis is totally safe.
They won't read your post thoroughly, and they won't notice that your definition of "overdose" does not include someone who takes a large dose of edible cannabis and then has a psychotic break.
If they lose touch with reality, and jump off a cliff, I am imagining you following their mourning family around, saying "but it wasn't an overdose, or at least the cannabis was not responsible! At least, not by my definition, and everything is very clear to me."

Maybe you didn't read my post thoroughly? I said that the dividing line between how drugs kill people directly and how they lead to people's deaths due to their beliefs/behavior while fucked up on the drug is not always absolutely clear. I did not mention the LD50 of cannabis, nor about how it compares to other drugs in this way, because it is not directly relevant to the point I was making. (I also believed, wrongly perhaps, that everyone here already knew these things. And, they do not really address my point, which was about the nature of the categories of "causation of death" and how it is not always easy to assign responsibility to a single factor. In fact, cannabis, which we can say essentially does not kill directly by pharmacological action, is a perfect test case for my perspective for this reason.)

And, how many people in the world are "healthy" with no pre-existing health conditions? Did you ignore the others, probably at least half of the world's population, in your conclusion?

If a person with a heart condition does all sorts of things that would be fine for a healthy person they can die, like going for a run, having sex, watching a scary movie, etc.But none would ever be considered the TRUE cause of death as in a heroin or alcohol overdose , just a potentiating factor.

I admire your confidence in the black-and-white nature of these categories, but theoretically, it is a somewhat weak claim, especially since you did not respond to or discuss the grey-scale nature of the categories in some types of situations, like those I cited.
I also doubt that this confidence extends to all (hypothetical) situations in which your emotions are involved.

If you died after smoking weed because you had a weak heart which had been fine for the past decades, until the moment you smoked that weed, are you sure you (or at least your family) wouldn't blame the weed at all? Because the situation is so clear to you, and you would know what the TRUE cause of death was? And, is this the message we want to send to our readers - you might die, but don't worry, it's not weed's fault!

If you had a psychotic break after smoking weed your first time, like my friend did, after 25 years of apparently sane and sober life, are you sure you would say that "the TRUE cause was nothing to do with the weed - here, let's smoke another bowl, just to confirm." ?

My point was that it is not always easy to assign responsibility for causation, and that this is true while discussing drugs and death as well. This point is well-discussed in the philosophical literature (though possibly only poorly discussed by me, I will admit) and if you don't understand it it may be because I did not explain it clearly, or for some other reason, but it does not make it any less true.

Please don't imagine that there is always exactly one TRUE cause of death in every situation, or that the drug which stimulates someone's brain to go haywire is never responsible for any of the harm.

While cannabis is one of the safest drugs that is commonly used (and probably the very safest), trying to argue that it can never cause harm, or can never be at least partially responsible for someone's death, or that no situations exist in which blame/responsibility is not clearly assignable, is just fantasy.

 

[Mycophile]

Let me start by saying that I am a huge fan of cannabis, so I am not trying to make it sound bad because I have some ulterior purpose. My only purpose is harm reduction and accurate dissemination of information. So, when I criticize your post below, it is not personal, but only in the interest of serving these purposes. I have no other agenda.

On the other hand, I wonder if you have an agenda.
Like, other than harm reduction. Like, you are trying to "stick up" for weed, not just discuss the issues in an impartial way.
Your conclusion, which I highlighted in red, suggests that you do/did, and that you forgot about harm reduction or were not aware that this is the purpose of Bluelight, or maybe that you simply didn't know that your post does not help this purpose, and even hurts it.
I would say that what you said is fairly dangerous misinformation.

Here is how to spread such misinformation.
First, cite some numbers and statistics.
Say that you are appealing to "plain science" (as if there were another type of science).
Then, use a term ("overdose") in a way that can be ambiguous and make a grand, boldly conclusive generalization of a statement that is supposedly "supported" by the numbers.
For this, you would be better off in politics, where the approach seems to be very successful, instead of BL.

One problem is that some people may read through your post and decide that cannabis is totally safe.
They won't read your post thoroughly, and they won't notice that your definition of "overdose" does not include someone who takes a large dose of edible cannabis and then has a psychotic break.
If they lose touch with reality, and jump off a cliff, I am imagining you following their mourning family around, saying "but it wasn't an overdose, or at least the cannabis was not responsible! At least, not by my definition, and everything is very clear to me."

Maybe you didn't read my post thoroughly? I said that the dividing line between how drugs kill people directly and how they lead to people's deaths due to their beliefs/behavior while fucked up on the drug is not always absolutely clear. I did not mention the LD50 of cannabis, nor about how it compares to other drugs in this way, because it is not directly relevant to the point I was making. (I also believed, wrongly perhaps, that everyone here already knew these things. And, they do not really address my point, which was about the nature of the categories of "causation of death" and how it is not always easy to assign responsibility to a single factor. In fact, cannabis, which we can say essentially does not kill directly by pharmacological action, is a perfect test case for my perspective for this reason.)

And, how many people in the world are "healthy" with no pre-existing health conditions? Did you ignore the others, probably at least half of the world's population, in your conclusion?



I admire your confidence in the black-and-white nature of these categories, but theoretically, it is a somewhat weak claim, especially since you did not respond to or discuss the grey-scale nature of the categories in some types of situations, like those I cited.
I also doubt that this confidence extends to all (hypothetical) situations in which your emotions are involved.

If you died after smoking weed because you had a weak heart which had been fine for the past decades, until the moment you smoked that weed, are you sure you (or at least your family) wouldn't blame the weed at all? Because the situation is so clear to you, and you would know what the TRUE cause of death was? And, is this the message we want to send to our readers - you might die, but don't worry, it's not weed's fault!

If you had a psychotic break after smoking weed your first time, like my friend did, after 25 years of apparently sane and sober life, are you sure you would say that "the TRUE cause was nothing to do with the weed - here, let's smoke another bowl, just to confirm." ?

My point was that it is not always easy to assign responsibility for causation, and that this is true while discussing drugs and death as well. This point is well-discussed in the philosophical literature (though possibly only poorly discussed by me, I will admit) and if you don't understand it it may be because I did not explain it clearly, or for some other reason, but it does not make it any less true.

Please don't imagine that there is always exactly one TRUE cause of death in every situation, or that the drug which stimulates someone's brain to go haywire is never responsible for any of the harm.

While cannabis is one of the safest drugs that is commonly used (and probably the very safest), trying to argue that it can never cause harm, or can never be at least partially responsible for someone's death, or that no situations exist in which blame/responsibility is not clearly assignable, is just fantasy.

Thanks for responding and I really do agree with almost everything you've said here.

It's a long post so instead of responding to all of it, which really isn't necessary, I'll make the shortest post possible to explain what I meant and how I pretty much agree with you:

First, I don't have another agenda really, I mean I like to defend weed but I don't smoke much these days, really TO ME if I were to personally say I have "another agenda" the only extent to which I would personally say I DO, is the idea of personal responsibility and ownership of what we do to ourselves and not blaming outcomes on static objects (drugs or otherwise, as we could also be talking about guns here for example) other than owning up to making poor decisions.

I admit that this being an HR site is maybe not the best place to have a debate over things like this when people might misread what I am saying and NEVER EVER did I say "weed cannot be partially responsible for someone's death or hurt anyone."

I never said that AT ALL.

If you look at my post I said it can be a "contributing factor" and anything that can EVER be factor in a death is one to be avoided if you are not 110% POSITIVE that you can use the drug or item RESPONSIBLY.

But that's what I take issue with: whether it's weed or mushrooms or a gun or really anything else, object or otherwise, taking over the role of responsibilty for our actions.

I just feel like there are a lot of people who like to assign "blame" to certain things without realizing that ANYTHING can be used responsibly or irresponsibly and that bothers me at times.

For example: I went to Amsterdam years ago and loved that Shrooms were legal there, but now they were made illegal because some Englishman came over and ate some and had a psychotic break and jumped off a bridge and died.

I don't personally believe it's right that no one else can now take mushrooms in Amsterdam because of this one single incident where IMO it was probably more the person than the mushrooms which led to the fatality.

When someone commits suicide on alcohol we don't think twice about keeping it legal and such is the problem I see with giving our personal responsibility for keeping ourselves safe away and placing it on static objects like drugs and guns.


On the other hand, there ARE many drugs we all know of can DIRECTLY WITHOUT QUESTION lead to death without there even being barely any other factors, and I just personally happen to believe that, for example, there's a clear cut distinction between Fentanyl and how it can cause death, and marijuanna.

Some might see it as nit picking, but I don't, because really, it's probably pretty difficult to use Fentanyl responsibly (I don't know for sure, never used it and never will) and so to some extent, placing more of the blame on the substance in that one case, and not AS MUCH on the user, is perhaps warranted.

It is still, nevertheless IMO, the user who is responsible for his or her own actions.

There is a MASSIVE grey area in fact which I agree with on you, regarding the fact that most of us aren't 100% healthy, and in many cases weed and other things we think are more benign, can be VERY destructive.

Weed has also hurt me in some ways, exacerbating my asthma, leading to social isolation and my desire to drink more alcohol because I like the combo, leading to weight gain and probably raised liver enzymes etc.


BUT, in those cases, I was the fool who KNEW he had asthma and decided to smoke anyway, who KNEW he'd be more prone to drinking alcohol excessively when smoking and would probably gain weight and stress his liver, and still, did it anyway.


So of course weed and many other things can all be SERIOUS potentiating factors in deaths, mental illness, and all other sorts of problems.


The only other "agenda" I have, as mentioned, is people not taking personal responsibility for their actions and placing bad outcomes on a drug itself.

There are also real dangers associated with placing direct blame on object or idea and not acknowledging our own responsibility in keeping ourselves safe.

I personally feel like if I realize that ANYTHING can be dangerous if used incorrectly (or possibly be useful if used correctly) that I'll try harder to exercise control and consider my actions ahead of time...

 

[slimvictor]

^ Thanks for your response.
I am happy to hear that your agenda was not what I suspected, and that we agree on nearly all of the issues involved.
I even generally agree with what you just brought up about taking personal responsibility for one's own drug use.
"Whiskey killed him" is bullshit to me - I would say "He killed himself with whiskey" instead.

However, personally, I would prefer to see you make that argument with regards to meth or heroin or whiskey or something else in order to show that even stronger drugs are just tools being controlled by a human being's mind, because the argument is more effective in this way.
Mostly, I was concerned with your wording and what some people might take away from it.
Glad we could communicate and come to an understanding.
Peace.