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Article: Why teenagers should steer clear of cannabis

chugs

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Feb 23, 2004
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A rather contentious article,

I think this line is rather weak and, for the most part unsubstantatiated:

“The issue of cross-sensitisation of cannabis/opioid receptors has been a controversial one, but these findings show the drug’s damaging effects on the reward structures of the brain,” van Oshe says. “There is now overwhelming evidence that nobody in the brain’s developmental stage – under the age of 21 – should use cannabis.”

If 5 million people have smoked cannabis in Australia there would be far more addicts. Best estimates put the number at approx (median) 74 000.

This is just 2% of the cannabis smoking population. If the affects were so striking and powerful, as suggested by the article, then we should be seeing a much higher level of prevelance.

What it indicates is that other factors are at work, balancing brain chemistry, and/or human behaviour that aren't being replicated in these animal studies.

anyway....

Why teenagers should steer clear of cannabis

* 16:21 05 July 2006
* NewScientist.com news service
* Gaia Vince

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* Neuropsychopharmacology
* Yasmin Hurd, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York
* Karolinska Institute, Sweden
* University of Maastricht, Netherlands

Adolescents' use of marijuana may increase the risk of heroin addiction later in life, a new study suggests. Researchers say the work adds to "overwhelming" evidence that people under 21 should not use marijuana because of the risk of damaging the developing brain.

The idea that smoking cannabis increases the user's chance of going on to take harder drugs such as heroin is highly contentious. Some dub cannabis a “gateway” drug, arguing that peer pressure and exposure to drug dealers will tempt users to escalate their drug use. Others insist that smoking cannabis is unrelated to further drug use.

Now research in rats suggests that using marijuana reduces future sensitivity to opioids, which makes people more vulnerable to heroin addiction later in life. It does so by altering the brain chemistry of marijuana users, say the researchers.

“Adolescents in particular should never take cannabis – it’s far too risky because the brain areas essential for behaviour and cognitive functioning are still developing and are very sensitive to drug exposure,” says Jasmin Hurd, who led the study at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

But Hurd acknowledges that most people who use cannabis begin in their teens. A recent survey reported that as many as 20% of 16-year-olds in the US and Europe had illegally used cannabis in the previous month.
"Teenage" rats

In order to explore how the adolescent use of cannabis affects later drug use, Hurd and colleagues set up an experiment in rats aimed to mirror human use as closely as possible.

In the first part of the trial, six “teenage” rats were given a small dose of THC – the active chemical in cannabis – every three days between the ages of 28 and 49 days, which is the equivalent of human ages 12 to 18. The amount of THC given was roughly equivalent to a human smoking one joint every three days, Hurd explains. A control group of six rats did not receive THC.

One week after the first part was completed, catheters were inserted in all 12 of the adult rats and they were able to self-administer heroin by pushing a lever.

“At first, all the rats behaved the same and began to self-administer heroin frequently,” says Hurd. “But after a while, they stabilised their daily intake at a certain level. We saw that the ones that had been on THC as teenagers stabilised their intake at a much higher level than the others – they appeared to be less sensitive to the effects of heroin. And this continued throughout their lives.”

Hurd says reduced sensitivity to the heroin means the rats take larger doses, which has been shown to increase the risk of addiction.
Drug memory

The researchers then examined specific brain cells in the rats, including the opioid and cannabinoid receptors. They found that the rats that had been given THC during adolescence had a significantly altered opioid system in the area associated with reward and positive emotions. This is also the area linked to addiction.

“These are very specific changes and they are long-lasting, so the brain may ‘remember’ past cannabis experimentation and be vulnerable to harder drugs later in life,” Hurd says.

Neurologist Jim van Os, a cannabis expert at the University of Maastricht in the Netherlands told New Scientist the research was a welcome addition to our understanding of how cannabis affects the adolescent brain.

“The issue of cross-sensitisation of cannabis/opioid receptors has been a controversial one, but these findings show the drug’s damaging effects on the reward structures of the brain,” van Oshe says. “There is now overwhelming evidence that nobody in the brain’s developmental stage – under the age of 21 – should use cannabis.”

The research appears in the online edition of Neuropsychopharmacology.
 
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You can make up studies to prove anything. It's as if New Scientists does it all the time, considering some of the stuff they publish.
 
Actually, ppl with developing brains shouldnt smoke cannabis as far as im concerned. I mean, say someone who began smoking at 10. They would have a bigger chance of addiction or memory loss.
 
^Exactly. It's not really a good idea to start regularly taking drugs at any stages through teenhood. The brain hasn't fully developed, but people still do it and not suffer any problems. But, still.. just a better idea to abstain. Even though I didn't ;)
 
I think its an utterly subjective and extremely difficult issue to determine:

Does occasional cannabis use, through childhood/puberty, cause negative or deterimental problems to your brain?

Some research indicates that cannabis has a protective effect thus negating some of the damage that could be happening.

Ultimately its about balance and moderation and i think that if i had a choice between all the shit kids ingest I would pick cannabis any day of the week. Even with heavy doses...
 
I used to have a very strongly held view from personal experience that heavy smoking during the early teen years causes signifcant mental/pyschological damage.

But lately I have been looking back on those years and I don't think I can justify those views even through my own experiences. Yes I did socially and academicly retreat during periods of heavy smoking, but as soon as I stopped heavy use I went in less than a year from a mix of border line passes mixed with a few fails to topping all my classes, socially things didn't go so well but the fact is I had those issues before I started smoking.


Overall I think marijuana was slightly benificial by helping to bring out my creative side. But still I would not recommend marijuana to teens, it just causes more problems than it is worth - wait till your a bit older and can better appreciate it.
 
i started smoking alot of dope when i was quite young in my teenage years and carried though on a daily habit for ten years, stopping every now and then once for six months at a time.

i left school when i was 16 and did a bit of this and that and relielised that instead of feeling hard done by the world and left out as a recluse i went back to school as a mature aged student at 19 and met many like minded people finished that year and went to uni for a couple of years deffering twice but gettting back to it eventully finished three years ago and havent looked back. i only cut back my intake after spending in mental health and working with quite young people with very big problems.

i feel that dope brings on mental illness for people pre-disposed to mental illness. i wouldn't change my life path for anything. by spending time thinking about what i wanted to do with my life i was able to get it right young, without having mid-life crisis when i'm forty thinking i've wasted my life.
 
The research seems highly flawed to me. Those rats probably wanted to get stoned again, so they pushed the button hoping for that to happen, but got the heroin hit instead. I highly doubt that smoking weed could "make" you want to use heroin. Hell, most of the weed smokers I know despise any sort of opiod.
 
gher said:
You can make up studies to prove anything. It's as if New Scientists does it all the time, considering some of the stuff they publish.

Are you forgetting The Intoxication Instinct... for my money one of the best articles I've read in contemporary media on the drugs issue.
 
great, this thread is going to be a wonderful debate between smokers (all who believe that weed is find) and the rest of us.

Cannabis is a fucking terrible drug, for anyone. Funnily enough, 40 odd years down the track, my mother and father have kicked all drugs - but they still smoke pot. They have numerous mental illnesses, manic depression - you name it.

I also agree with peaked - having the rats do heroin i don't believe has anything to do with the THC. I don't think anyone sets out to do any drug - heroin would be one of the drugs people would be less inclined to go out and try - without peer pressure.
 
^ Time and time again people think that drugs cause mental illness. I think an unfounded belief which is the primary cause as to why most intoxicants are illegal today.

What you have to ask yourself is this:

If there are slightly higher prevalence of mental illness in people who use drugs can you still definitely say that drugs caused that mental illness in the first place? Obviously there is a relationship but its unfounded to blame illegal intoxicants for causing the mental illness. Maybe it exacerbates some of the chemical imbalances however they’re not the driving factor

I think that everyone who has taken drugs, especially those who begun in childhood will be able to trace their drug use to a particular trauma (be it an acute trauma or problem that occurred/developed over years). The mental illness occurs prior to the unrestrained drug use – the rampant drug use is just a highly visible symptom of the illness, which due to the short sightedness of humans is mistakenly thought to be the cause/driver of the illness.

I believe the main causes of illness are caused by wider socio-economic changes which result in aberrant behavior, either by aggressors or the individual themselves. Things like racism, poverty, family break ups, bad communication, society’s expectations & taboos – to sum it up – “The Rat Race” are the fundamentally causes of mental illness.

For example – take teenagers who don't take drugs. Are they not just as likely to have some form of mental illness during childhood? How many people in our society can honestly say they never had depression (in their teenage years?). Smoking a joint for the first time is unlikely to make you an addict or cause you to spiral into mental illness. It’s the underlying problems in your life and the physiological nature of our brain (the reward centres) that propel the individual to use the drug again.

Think about it, an individual going through the first highly stressful period of they’re life – puberty, not to mention hundred's of "first" experiences - which inevitably, in light of family difficulties, genetic susceptibilities, and mistakes, cause trauma. Illegal drugs use is a form of self-medication, or denial mechanism that the mind mistakenly utilizes to heal itself, despite the users haphazard implement.

It is no different to say taking Prozac, a drug allowed by society. Illegal drug use, for the purpose of self-medication is driven by the very taboos and pressures in our society that caused the illness in the first place.

But in this case there is no chicken/egg conundrum. What comes first is the illness, then the drug taking. Its only when the illness is healed can the individual cease their rampant and destructive drug taking. I think that is why people tend to increase their dose – the drugs never really solve the problem. They just seek to reduce the symptoms of it. Subconsciously this just compels the user to take more in the mistaken belief that it’s a physiological need that is driving the drug use.
 
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