Tópico: Legalizar a "maconha" - Cannabis sativa

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Esquece meu último post....

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

E vou dormir!

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Já agora, algum estudo independente?

[HSette]

 

[Taleb]

Aonde você viu alguém falando em punição a crimes que ninguém cometeu? Se a lei prevesse punissão à usuários igual a traficantes, um usuário seria um criminoso e seria punido por isso.

Achei que o crime fosse ter causado dano à sociedade... se não causou dano, por que é crime?

Partindo dessa sua lógica, posso considerar que a proibição de qualquer substância é uma proibição indiscriminatória.

Será? em se tratando do ser para drogas pesadas, creio que vale a pena. mas de qualquer jeito, não prev6e que usuário e traficante devam receber a mesma punição! a lei que você colocou, defende isso.

Como diria o HSette: sem chance!

É exatamente esse o ponto Hendrik, se for melhorar o quadro do bem estar social sou a favor, tanto da legalização quanto da punição de usuários, só precisamos de dados para avaliar qual seria a melhor medida a ser tomado

Então há que ver em países onde tal se deu.

Podemos ver a Holanda, por exemplo.

Hendrik, eu quis dizer que se a lei que eu sugeri fosse aprovada o fato de comprar e consumir uma substância ilegal seria crime.

Quanto a Holanda, você tem dados de aumento/diminuição de criminalidade? Lá existia um comércio ilegal do tamanho que existe no Brasil? Lá o mesmo comércio ilegal era diretamente ligado ao alto índice de violência como no Brasil?

Como to cansando de dizer, se isso for melhor para um bem estar social, tô contigo, caso contrário, punição mais severá aos usuários.

[Diegojaf]

Será que uma empresa contrataria um cara que testou positivo no teste para detecção de maconha?
Um cara que usasse Hachiche (é assim q se escreve?) daria positivo no teste de maconha?

Um baseado claramente deixa sequelas na pessoa que usou (deixa sim) por um tempo... o que causaria uma queda de desempenho em nível profissional, logo, a empresa poderia se dar ao direito de não contratar usuários... Não sei se com o tempo isso mudaria...

Acho que enquanto não for legalizado, a punição ao usuário deveria ser mais severa, pois é ele quem movimenta o mercado e fornece aos traficantes o capital de giro necessário para investir em drogas/negócios mais pesados...

[Eleitor de Mário Oliveira]

Na minha opinião deve continuar a proibição e serem também proibidas outras drogas como cigarros (tabaco) e bebidas alcólicas. Estas e tantas outas drogas são fontes de inúmeros problemas de saúde e constante causa de desestabilização de famílias inteiras.

Facismo da geração saúde. Ninguém é obrigado a fumar ou beber. Já ouviu falar de liberdades fundamentais?

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Nos EUA houve um aumento significativo das taxas de usuários nocivos e dependentes entre os usuários de maconha entre os anos de 1991-1992 e 2001-2002 (30,2% e 35,6%, respectivamente)

Números assutadores, sem dúvida, mas deveriam ser comparados à outros:

"A federal survey in 1994 found that 31 percent of Americans over the age of twelve had tried marijuana, but only 0.8 percent smoked it every day or two even when they could—2.5 percent of those who’d tried it. Those figures have not changed much in subsequent surveys."

Este aumento pode estar relacionado, em parte, ao aumento do potencial adictivo da maconha, ou seja, houve um amento de 66% no teor de THC na amostra de maconha analisada em 2001-2002 (5,11%) comparativamente a de 1991-1992 (3,01% de THC)

Creio que isso é puro sensacionalismo do departamento anti-drogas dos EUA:

"In the first place, the THC content of each variety of cannabis is genetically determined and probably has remained fairly constant since prehistoric times. The government’s own statistics show that it hasn’t changed much in three decades.
...
Since 1972, the University of Mississippi Research Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences Potency Monitoring Project (PMP) has tested samples of marijuana seized by police. Most warnings about increased potency rest on comparisons of PMP figures after 1980 with those before. In the 1970s, when few samples were tested, the average recorded THC content was under 1 percent; one year it was 0.18 percent.

These numbers were due to incompetent storage and testing. If they had been accurate, the whole phenomenon of getting high would have had to have been a mass delusion. Marijuana with less than 0.5 percent THC has no mental effect whatsoever when smoked, and unless potency is above 1 percent, most people can’t tell the difference between pot and a placebo from which all THC has been removed with acetone. PharmChem, an independent street-drug testing service active in the 1970s, consistently recorded average THC levels between 2 and 5 percent. Around 1980, PMP scientists improved their procedures and began receiving more samples. Since then their yearly averages have held steady between 2.0 and 4.5 percent.

Nearly all of the PMP samples have been commercial grade mass-market pot rather than high-end connoisseur types, which, being sold in small quantities over small networks, are less vulnerable to law enforcement. Plant breeders have created some very strong varieties in recent years, but there is a genetic limit to THC content—10 to 20 percent in cured buds of the best varieties.
...
That brings us to the second and more important reason the potency scare is bunk: Cannabis rich in THC is actually safer than weaker material. The quick effect of smoking lets people titrate the dose, ingesting roughly the same amount of THC regardless of its concentration in the plant. Thus, the stronger the herb, the less a user smokes to get high, thereby inhaling less of the harmful compounds formed when any vegetation burns."

Num estudo prospectivo, iniciado em 1970, com acompanhamento por 12 anos, mostrou-se que 1 em cada 4 usuários de maconha desenvolveram síndrome de dependência no período compreendido entre a adolescência e a idade adulta jovem.

O uso da maconha por menores não penso estar em discussão. Também não defendo a legalização da maconha para menores.

Já a dependência, também parece haver controvérsias semânticas:

"The words “addiction” and “dependence” are often used interchangeably. Strictly speaking, addiction refers to a drug habit enforced by physical withdrawal symptoms that produce severe sickness or even death when one tries to quit. Because most pharmaceutical antidepressants can produce suicidal depression when stopped abruptly, they are addictive in this sense. Heroin, barbiturates, and alcohol cause addiction if used continually for long enough.

Dependence is a fuzzier term whose meaning varies with context and the person using it. One’s relationship with a plant spirit (the aboriginal term for a drug) can take many forms, all of which are called dependence by those who disapprove. It may mean a craving that the user regrets but feels helpless to control, like unrequited love. It may give pleasure followed by guilt, like cheating on a spouse. It can devolve into meaningless ritual that yields only self-hatred, like a bad marriage. Or it can simply mean occasional or continued use driven only by the user’s pleasure in it despite external condemnation—a rewarding fling or long-term affair."

Já descrevemos evidências de uma Síndrome de abstinência de maconha, mas também acumulam-se evidencias de tolerância a mesma através de estudos em animais e em humanos. Gatley e Volkow (1998) mostraram, em animais, que a administração crônica de canabinóide resultou no desenvolvimento de tolerância em relação aos efeitos agudos, incluindo os efeitos motores. Em relação aos seres humanos os sinais de aumento de tolerância são bem documentados e, regra geral, aparecem com doses acima de 3mg/kg/dia.

"Efforts to demonstrate THC addiction in the laboratory have fared poorly. Unlike the case of cocaine, opiates, alcohol, barbiturates, and other habit-formers, no matter how much THC you give the lab rats, after you stop, they do not press levers to get more of it. One group of researchers did succeed in producing physical withdrawal symptoms in mice, but only by injecting them with huge doses of THC for four days and then giving them an antagonist drug to immediately remove all cannabinoids, internal as well as external, from their receptors. This is in stark contrast to actual human use, which involves much lower levels of THC and gradual replacement of it at receptor sites by normal levels of endocannabinoids as the high wears off.

Studies on people have been even less encouraging for the treatment industry. In a 1967 experiment, ten men in the Federal Narcotics Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky, were required to inhale a joint every waking hour for a month, but doctors still found no withdrawal symptoms upon abruptly ending the smokathon. When another group of researchers fed volunteers enormous daily doses of pure THC for a month, then stopped, the subjects experienced nothing more serious than mild nervousness, sweating, and nighttime wakefulness, the same symptoms reported by about one-sixth of heavy users in the real world when they suddenly quit.
...
Most of the popular and scientific articles claiming to have verified marijuana addiction in humans are written by treatment providers. In fact, in a transparent effort to drum up business, some of them perversely argue that all cannabis use should be considered addiction, even when a person’s symptoms don’t satisfy their own professional guidelines for dependence—precisely because marijuana addiction is “subtle and difficult to identify.”"

• A substância é consumida com freqüência em quantidades maiores ou durante períodos mais longos do que se pretendia (consumo maior que o pretendido);

Creio que isso já foi comentado acima.

• Existe um desejo persistente ou esforços sem sucesso para eliminar ou controlar o uso da substância (tentativas frustradas de interrupção do uso);

Idem.

• Uma grande quantidade de tempo é despendida nas atividades necessárias para obtenção da substância, no uso e na recuperação de seus efeitos (tempo gasto com a droga);

Esse não entendi. A aquisição de maconha é mais fácil que comprar pão. Se legalizada, mais fácil ainda, além de bem menos perigoso. No uso, talvez refira-se à "viagem", que dura poucas horas. Então é questão de liberdade mesmo. Se o cara que passar suas horas de lazer num bar, vendo futebol, indo ao cinema ou viajando na erva, é lá com ele. Demora bem menos tempo a se recuperar de uma "viagem" que se recuperar de uma bebedeira, mas mais tempo que se recuperar de um filme, concordo. Mas o tempo é do cara. Não interferindo em seus deveres cívicos, qual o problema?

• Existe o abandono de importantes atividades sociais, ocupacionais ou recreacionais em função do uso da substância (droga como prioridade);

Isso está com cara de lenda urbana. Vou colar um extenso texto sobre o assunto, mas primeiro gostaria de saber de quem experiência universitária se de fato ninguém estuda nas universidades ou usuários de maconha são os piores da turma.

Abandono de atividades recreacionais??? e se fumar o baseado for a atividade recreacional do cara?

"Several scientists have investigated marijuana’s effect on work by setting up artificial mini-economies in live-in laboratories. In one, male volunteers stayed in a hospital ward for three months. They had to smoke one joint per day and do office-style make-work. They were paid in tokens, which they could use to buy extra weed during the project or redeem for cash at its end. The men’s average consumption of 5 joints a day had no effect on their work time, efficiency, or scores on psychological tests.

In a similar one-month residential study, heavy cannabis smokers worked harder, produced more, and earned more tokens than moderate smokers or abstainers, even though they took time off now and then to kick back and get thoroughly stoned. Because they worked harder when they were working, they were able to use many tokens to buy extra pot yet still turn in the same number for cash as the other two groups.

A Canadian study had 6 live-in workers do moderately satisfying manual labor for 70 days—making chairs. It began with a period of abstinence to establish a baseline production rate. Once the subjects were given cannabis to smoke, their productivity declined for a few days, then soon exceeded the baseline level. Again, the heaviest smokers spent the least time working but achieved the same output as the others by working more efficiently when they did work. And during the period of greatest allowed intake, the smokers organized two strikes and got higher pay for everyone! Maybe that’s the real reason the herb is illegal. Following a short production decline after the strikes, output again surpassed the baseline.

At Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Richard Foltin had found that, when high, people would rather relax than do something boring. To confirm this alleged evidence that marijuana saps ambition, he put new testees through two weeks of “low-probability activities”—insanely dull assignments designed to mimic the worst jobs, like sorting bins of plastic chips by color and size, or alphabetizing lists of 500 nonsense words. After finding out which tasks each person considered the most and least onerous, he made subjects work many hours at their worst job for the right to do their least detested one. Foltin predicted that marijuana would make them less willing to get through the bad crap for the slightly better crap, but actually the reverse was true. He refused to accept his own results and called for more research to find amotivational syndrome.

The foregoing evidence for motivational syndrome is corroborated by research on actual workers. Anthropologists have studied farm laborers in Jamaica, Costa Rica, and Greece, and confirmed what their subjects told them, that ganja breaks help them work harder. In Costa Rica, the heaviest users had the best jobs, even though cannabis users on the whole were more often unemployed, due to being arrested under the drug laws.

In the United States, several groups of scientists have used data from a long-term study of 400 men in New York State and another of 12,000 adults throughout the country. Two of them found more unemployment and fewer work hours among marijuana users, but also found they averaged higher wages. Another, using a larger sample of workers who’d held several jobs, found no difference in work hours between users and nonusers. Again, higher wages and greater cannabis use were linked. Either the more grass people smoke, the more money they make, or the more money they make, the more grass they buy. A flurry of studies in the 1990s confirmed that cannabis smokers get paid as much as or more than their abstaining peers. Nor do pot smokers get fired more often than abstainers, unless they get snagged by a piss test. In fact, two unpublished in-house reviews in the electric utility industry suggest that workers who test positive for only marijuana get promoted more often, are absent 30 percent less often, and use fewer health insurance benefits than workers who never failed a drug test. Since cannabis is by far the most popular illicit drug, and since its metabolites remain in the body much longer than those of other illegal drugs, the vast majority of workplace urine-test positives are for marijuana use off the job. Firing these workers is beating a live horse—to death."

• O uso da substância é continuado, apesar do conhecimento de ser um problema persistente ou recorrente físico ou psicológico que tenha sido causado ou exacerbado pela substância (uso da droga a despeito dos problemas por ela causados).

Já respondido.

Mas acho uma pena estarmos usando para o Brasil estudos feitos para os EUA. Seria bom que tivessemos estudos daqui, para ver quem continua usando, a frequencia que continua usando, quanto continua usando, o que continua usando, o que fez, o que faz, como fez, como faz, etc..

Tudo que temos são anedotas.

Embora seja clara a evidência de uma Síndrome de Dependência de Maconha nem todo usuário tende a desenvolvê-la. Ainda que haja extenso debate sobre a existência de uma Síndrome de Dependência de Maconha, não se pode negar que se acumulam inúmeras evidências da mesma.

Isso me parece auto-contraditório, pralém do óbvio, como mostrado nos textos acima, que não existem "inúmeras evidências" e a confusão que fazem entre dependência e adicção.

Pelo que li, não é "nem todo usuário" que a desenvolve, mas bem poucos mesmo. E isso entre os usadores peso-pesado. Se maconha causa adicção e dependência físicas, como pode ser que todo mundo que a usa ou usou com certa regularidade não tenha ficado viciado?

[]'s

Hendrik

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Hendrik, eu quis dizer que se a lei que eu sugeri fosse aprovada o fato de comprar e consumir uma substância ilegal seria crime.

Eu entendi. Não concordo é com a equiparação punitiva para usuário e fornecedor.

Quanto a Holanda, você tem dados de aumento/diminuição de criminalidade? Lá existia um comércio ilegal do tamanho que existe no Brasil? Lá o mesmo comércio ilegal era diretamente ligado ao alto índice de violência como no Brasil?

Como to cansando de dizer, se isso for melhor para um bem estar social, tô contigo, caso contrário, punição mais severá aos usuários.

Então nada feito, Cezar. Mesmo que pesquise sobre esses dados, você os rejeitaria por não serem adequados à realidade brasileira, restando-nos a especulação como única forma de tratar do assunto, ou seja, sem que uma conclusão possa ser validamente tirada, já que não há dados factuais que possam basear qualquer das suas duas propostas. Todos os dados postos aqui são referentes à outros países, logo não são aceitáveis, segundo você diz.

Então suas duas propostas podem apenas serem tratadas como jogos do "se".

[]'s

Hendrik

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Este estudo, por exemplo, me parece ser falho:

"Tanda et al. (2000) demonstrated for the first time that animals self-administer THC. They write in their abstract:

"Many attempts to obtain reliable self-administration behavior by laboratory animals with delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana, have been unsuccessful. Because self-administration behavior has been demonstrated in laboratory animals for almost all other psychoactive drugs abused by humans, as well as for nicotine, the psychoactive ingredient in tobacco, these studies would seem to indicate that marijuana has less potential for abuse. Here we show persistent intravenous self-administration behavior by monkeys for doses of THC lower than doses used in previous studies, but comparable to doses in marijuana smoke inhaled by humans" (Tanda et al. 2000).

In this study Tanda, Munzar and Goldberg used a low but clinically relevant dose of THC administered intravenously in a clear solution. This solution rapidly distributed THC to the brain. Previous attempts to show self-administration, using much higher doses of THC held in a suspension, failed. One reason for this may be that, although higher doses were used, the suspension resulted in less brain penetration. In this study, the monkeys had previously been trained to self-administer cocaine by pressing a lever 10 times. When saline was substituted for cocaine, self-administration stopped. When THC replaced the saline, the monkeys quickly started to press the lever again. The monkeys gave themselves about 30 injections during an hour-long session, which equates roughly with the dose received by a person smoking a marijuana joint."

Então primeiro viciam os macacos em cocaína, que É adicctiva, depois tiram a coca, põe saline e não querem mais. Aí botam THC, os macacos se atiram à isso e a conclusão é que THC vicia?

[]'s

Hendrik

[HSette]

Hendrick, parece-me que não há realmente nada de conclusivo.

Fazendo as devidas abstrações da questão religiosa / espiritualista, acho que o caminho trilhado pelo pessoal do Santo Daime para conseguir a liberação do uso da Ahyauasca pode servir de exemplo.

Há um breve histórico em:
http://www.santodaime.org/institucional/historico.htm

E a ata do CONFEN (Conselho Federal de Entorpecentes) sobre o assunto em:
http://www.santodaime.org/institucional/ata_confen.htm

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Pois é, HSette. E sem querer ser conspiracionista, acho que a discriminação cultural que envolve o assunto também não ajuda que pesquisas independentes sejam levadas. Imagina que até o hemp, que dá prá usar para fazer um monte de coisa, foi na onda e banido e tido como droga.

Então fica a pergunta: legalizar algo que não se conhece bem?

[HSette]

Há algum grupo pró-legalização que caminhe nesse sentido - pesquisas científicas que embasem sua argumentação?

Não vejo outro caminho a não ser esse.

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Mas aí não ficaria suspeito?

Mesmo porque nos EUA tem de terem permissão do departamemte anti-drogas. Tava lendo a história de um sujeito tendo a maior dificuldade para pesquisar hemp!

Achei que talvez a Holanda tivesse. Nunca pesquisei por aquelas zonas.

Lá tem os bares para fumar. Só pode comprar e fumar lá.

[HSette]

É só encomendar uma pesquisa para uma instiuição independente e insuspeita (se é que isso existe).

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Fundear uma pesquisa dessas não deve ser barato. É coisa que pode levar décadas.

[Taleb]

Hendrik, eu quis dizer que se a lei que eu sugeri fosse aprovada o fato de comprar e consumir uma substância ilegal seria crime.

Eu entendi. Não concordo é com a equiparação punitiva para usuário e fornecedor.

Quanto a Holanda, você tem dados de aumento/diminuição de criminalidade? Lá existia um comércio ilegal do tamanho que existe no Brasil? Lá o mesmo comércio ilegal era diretamente ligado ao alto índice de violência como no Brasil?

Como to cansando de dizer, se isso for melhor para um bem estar social, tô contigo, caso contrário, punição mais severá aos usuários.

Então nada feito, Cezar. Mesmo que pesquise sobre esses dados, você os rejeitaria por não serem adequados à realidade brasileira, restando-nos a especulação como única forma de tratar do assunto, ou seja, sem que uma conclusão possa ser validamente tirada, já que não há dados factuais que possam basear qualquer das suas duas propostas. Todos os dados postos aqui são referentes à outros países, logo não são aceitáveis, segundo você diz.

Não Hendrik, em nenhum momento eu disse que não aceitaria dados de outros países, e sim, que os dados que mais nos interessam são os de países onde esse problema seja mais parecido com o problema que enfrentamos no Brasil. Se a Holanda for o único país que possuí esses dados, vamos estudá-los.
Existe algum país latino-americano onde se legalizou? Existe algum país latino-americano onde a punição é mais severá para usuários?

[Rhyan]

Sou a favor da legalização de qualquer droga.

A legalização é sempre menor pior socialmente que a proibição. O mesmo com as armas, a prostituição, etc..

[]'s

[Taleb]

Sou a favor da legalização de qualquer droga.

A legalização é sempre menor pior socialmente que a proibição. O mesmo com as armas, a prostituição, etc..

[]'s

Você tem dados que comprovam sua afirmação?

[Rhyan]

Não, pois em nenhum lugar é assim.

Mas é difícil imaginar a venda de drogas pela iniciativa privada acabando com o crime organizado.

[]'s

[HSette]

Não, pois em nenhum lugar é assim.

Mas é difícil imaginar a venda de drogas pela iniciativa privada acabando com o crime organizado.

[]'s

Não entendi a relação.

O crime organizado existiria, existe e existirá independente do tráfico de drogas.
Veja o caso da Lei Seca nos EUA. A maior fonte de grana na época era a venda ilegal de álcool. Depois que liberou, eles se rearrumaram rapidamente.

Hoje, pelo que parece, o filão é o dinheiro público.

[Rhyan]

"Acabar" foi exagero, melhor seria "enfraquecer".

[HSette]

"Acabar" foi exagero, melhor seria "enfraquecer".

Ah, bom.

Sobre algum lugar que servisse de exemplo:

Os Países Baixos não serviriam como parâmetro?
Tentei encontrar alguma estatística mas não encontrei nada.

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

A lista é longa, mas é um bom sumários dos prós. Quaisquer falhar, é só apontar:

"MYTH: MARIJUANA'S HARMS HAVE BEEN PROVED SCIENTIFICALLY. In the 1960s and 1970s, many people believed that marijuana was harmless. Today we know that marijuana is much more dangerous than previously believed.

FACT: In 1972, after reviewing the scientific evidence, the National Commission on Marihuana and Drug Abuse concluded that while marijuana was not entirely safe, its dangers had been grossly overstated. Since then, researchers have conducted thousands of studies of humans, animals, and cell cultures. None reveal any findings dramatically different from those described by the National Commission in 1972. In 1995, based on thirty years of scientific research editors of the British medical journal Lancet concluded that "the smoking of cannabis, even long term, is not harmful to health."

MYTH: MARIJUANA HAS NO MEDICINAL VALUE. Safer, more effective drugs are available. They include a synthetic version of THC, marijuana's primary active ingredient, which is marketed in the United States under the name Marinol.

FACT: Marijuana has been shown to be effective in reducing the nausea induced by cancer chemotherapy, stimulating appetite in AIDS patients, and reducing intraocular pressure in people with glaucoma. There is also appreciable evidence that marijuana reduces muscle spasticity in patients with neurological disorders. A synthetic capsule is available by prescription, but it is not as effective as smoked marijuana for many patients. Pure THC may also produce more unpleasant psychoactive side effects than smoked marijuana. Many people use marijuana as a medicine today, despite its illegality. In doing so, they risk arrest and imprisonment.

MYTH: MARIJUANA IS HIGHLY ADDICTIVE. Long term marijuana users experience physical dependence and withdrawal, and often need professional drug treatment to break their marijuana habits.

FACT: Most people who smoke marijuana smoke it only occasionally. A small minority of Americans - less than 1 percent - smoke marijuana on a daily basis. An even smaller minority develop a dependence on marijuana. Some people who smoke marijuana heavily and frequently stop without difficulty. Others seek help from drug treatment professionals. Marijuana does not cause physical dependence. If people experience withdrawal symptoms at all, they are remarkably mild.

MYTH: MARIJUANA IS A GATEWAY DRUG. Even if marijuana itself causes minimal harm, it is a dangerous substance because it leads to the use of "harder drugs" like heroin, LSD, and cocaine.

FACT: Marijuana does not cause people to use hard drugs. What the gateway theory presents as a causal explanation is a statistic association between common and uncommon drugs, an association that changes over time as different drugs increase and decrease in prevalence. Marijuana is the most popular illegal drug in the United States today. Therefore, people who have used less popular drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and LSD, are likely to have also used marijuana. Most marijuana users never use any other illegal drug. Indeed, for the large majority of people, marijuana is a terminus rather than a gateway drug.

MYTH: MARIJUANA OFFENSES ARE NOT SEVERELY PUNISHED. Few marijuana law violators are arrested and hardly anyone goes to prison. This lenient treatment is responsible for marijuana continued availability and use.

FACT: Marijuana arrests in the United States doubled between 1991 and 1995. In 1995, more than one-half-million people were arrested for marijuana offenses. Eighty-six percent of them were arrested for marijuana possession. Tens of thousands of people are now in prison or marijuana offenses. An even greater number are punished with probation, fines, and civil sanctions, including having their property seized, their driver's license revoked, and their employment terminated. Despite these civil and criminal sanctions, marijuana continues to be readily available and widely used.

MYTH: MARIJUANA POLICY IN THE NETHERLANDS IS A FAILURE. Dutch law, which allows marijuana to be bought, sold, and used openly, has resulted in increasing rates of marijuana use, particularly in youth.

FACT: The Netherlands' drug policy is the most nonpunitive in Europe. For more than twenty years, Dutch citizens over age eighteen have been permitted to buy and use cannabis (marijuana and hashish) in government-regulated coffee shops. This policy has not resulted in dramatically escalating cannabis use. For most age groups, rates of marijuana use in the Netherlands are similar to those in the United States. However, for young adolescents, rates of marijuana use are lower in the Netherlands than in the United States. The Dutch people overwhelmingly approve of current cannabis policy which seeks to normalize rather than dramatize cannabis use. The Dutch government occasionally revises existing policy, but it remains committed to decriminalization.

MYTH: MARIJUANA KILLS BRAIN CELLS. Used over time, marijuana permanently alters brain structure and function, causing memory loss, cognitive impairment, personality deterioration, and reduced productivity.

FACT: None of the medical tests currently used to detect brain damage in humans have found harm from marijuana, even from long term high-dose use. An early study reported brain damage in rhesus monkeys after six months exposure to high concentrations of marijuana smoke. In a recent, more carefully conducted study, researchers found no evidence of brain abnormality in monkeys that were forced to inhale the equivalent of four to five marijuana cigarettes every day for a year. The claim that marijuana kills brain cells is based on a speculative report dating back a quarter of a century that has never been supported by any scientific study.

MYTH: MARIJUANA CAUSES AN AMOTIVATIONAL SYNDROME. Marijuana makes users passive, apathetic, and uninterested in the future. Students who use marijuana become underachievers and workers who use marijuana become unproductive.

FACT: For twenty-five years, researchers have searched for a marijuana-induced amotivational syndrome and have failed to find it. People who are intoxicated constantly, regardless of the drug, are unlikely to be productive members of society. There is nothing about marijuana specifically that causes people to lose their drive and ambition. In laboratory studies, subjects given high doses of marijuana for several days or even several weeks exhibit no decrease in work motivation or productivity. Among working adults, marijuana users tend to earn higher wages than non-users. College students who use marijuana have the same grades as nonusers. Among high school students, heavy use is associated with school failure, but school failure usually comes first.

MYTH: MARIJUANA IMPAIRS MEMORY AND COGNITION. Under the influence of marijuana, people are unable to think rationally and intelligently. Chronic marijuana use causes permanent mental impairment.

FACT: Marijuana produces immediate, temporary changes in thoughts, perceptions, and information processing. The cognitive process most clearly affected by marijuana is short-term memory. In laboratory studies, subjects under the influence of marijuana have no trouble remembering things they learned previously. However, they display diminished capacity to learn and recall new information. This diminishment only lasts for the duration of the intoxication. There is no convincing evidence that heavy long-term marijuana use permanently impairs memory or other cognitive functions.

MYTH: MARIJUANA CAN CAUSE PERMANENT MENTAL ILLNESS. Among adolescents, even occasional marijuana use may cause psychological damage. During intoxication, marijuana users become irrational and often behave erratically.

FACT: There is no convincing scientific evidence that marijuana causes psychological damage or mental illness in either teenagers or adults. Some marijuana users experience psychological distress following marijuana ingestion, which may include feelings of panic, anxiety, and paranoia. Such experiences can be frightening, but the effects are temporary. With very large doses, marijuana can cause temporary toxic psychosis. This occurs rarely, and almost always when marijuana is eaten rather than smoked. Marijuana does not cause profound changes in people's behavior.

MYTH: MARIJUANA CAUSES CRIME. Marijuana users commit more property offenses than nonusers. Under the influence of marijuana, people become irrational, aggressive, and violent.

FACT: Every serious scholar and government commission examining the relationship between marijuana use and crime has reached the same conclusion: marijuana does not cause crime. The vast majority of marijuana users do not commit crimes other than the crime of possessing marijuana. Among marijuana users who do commit crimes, marijuana plays no causal role. Almost all human and animal studies show that marijuana decreases rather than increases aggression.

MYTH: MARIJUANA INTERFERES WITH MALE AND FEMALE SEX HORMONES. In both men and women, marijuana can cause infertility. Marijuana retards sexual development in adolescents. It produces feminine characteristics in males and masculine characteristics in females.

FACT: There is no evidence that marijuana causes infertility in men or women. In animal studies, high doses of THC diminish the production of some sex hormones and can impair reproduction. However, most studies of humans have found that marijuana has no impact of sex hormones. In those studies showing an impact, it is modest, temporary, and of no apparent consequence for reproduction. There is no scientific evidence that marijuana delays adolescent sexual development, has feminizing effect on males, or a masculinizing effect on females.

MYTH: MARIJUANA USE DURING PREGNANCY DAMAGES THE FETUS. Prenatal marijuana exposure causes birth defects in babies, and, as they grow older, developmental problems. The health and well being of the next generation is threatened by marijuana use by pregnant women.

FACT: Studies of newborns, infants, and children show no consistent physical, developmental, or cognitive deficits related to prenatal marijuana exposure. Marijuana had no reliable impact on birth size, length of gestation, neurological development, or the occurrence of physical abnormalities. The administration of hundreds of tests to older children has revealed only minor differences between offspring of marijuana users and nonusers, and some are positive rather than negative. Two unconfirmed case-control studies identified prenatal marijuana exposure as one of many factors statistically associated with childhood cancer. Given other available evidence, it is highly unlikely that marijuana causes cancer in children.

MYTH: MARIJUANA USE IMPAIRS THE IMMUNE SYSTEM. Marijuana users are at increased risk of infection, including HIV. AIDS patients are particularly vulnerable to marijuana's immunopathic effects because their immune systems are already suppressed.

FACT: There is no evidence that marijuana users are more susceptible to infections than nonusers. Nor is there evidence that marijuana lowers users' resistance to sexually transmitted diseases. Early studies which showed decreased immune function in cells taken from marijuana users have since been disproved. Animals given extremely large doses of THC and exposed to a virus have higher rates of infection. Such studies have little relevance to humans. Even among people with existing immune disorders, such as AIDS, marijuana use appears to be relatively safe. However, the recent finding of an association between tobacco smoking and lung infection in AIDS patients warrants further research into possible harm from marijuana smoking in immune suppressed persons.

MYTH: MARIJUANA IS MORE DAMAGING TO THE LUNGS THAN TOBACCO. Marijuana smokers are at a high risk of developing lung cancer, bronchitis, and emphysema.

FACT: Moderate smoking of marijuana appears to pose minimal danger to the lungs. Like tobacco smoke, marijuana smoke contains a number of irritants and carcinogens. But marijuana users typically smoke much less often than tobacco smokers, and over time, inhale much less smoke. As a result, the risk of serious lung damage should be lower in marijuana smokers. There have been no reports of lung cancer related solely to marijuana. However, because researchers have found precancerous changes in cells taken from the lungs of heavy marijuana smokers, the possibility of lung cancer from marijuana cannot be ruled out. Unlike heavy tobacco smokers, heavy marijuana smokers exhibit no obstruction of the lung's small airway. That indicates that people will not develop emphysema from smoking marijuana.

MYTH: MARIJUANA'S ACTIVE INGREDIENT, THC, GETS TRAPPED IN BODY FAT. Because THC is released from fat cells slowly, psychoactive effects may last for days or weeks following use. THC's long persistence in the body damages organs that are high in fat content, the brain in particular.

FACT: Many active drugs enter the body's fat cells. What is different (but not unique) about THC is that it exits fat cells slowly. As a result, traces of marijuana can be found in the body for days or weeks following ingestion. However, within a few hours of smoking marijuana, the amount of THC in the brain falls below the concentration required for detectable psychoactivity. The fat cells in which THC lingers are not harmed by the drug's presence, nor is the brain or other organs. The most important consequence of marijuana's slow excretion is that it can be detected in blood, urine, and tissue long after it is used, and long after its psychoactivity has ended.

MYTH: MARIJUANA USE IS A MAJOR CAUSE OF HIGHWAY ACCIDENTS. Like alcohol, marijuana impairs psychomotor function and decreases driving ability. If marijuana use increases, an increase in of traffic fatalities is inevitable.

FACT: There is no compelling evidence that marijuana contributes substantially to traffic accidents and fatalities. At some doses, marijuana affects perception and psychomotor performances- changes which could impair driving ability. However, in driving studies, marijuana produces little or no car-handling impairment- consistently less than produced by low moderate doses of alcohol and many legal medications. In contrast to alcohol, which tends to increase risky driving practices, marijuana tends to make subjects more cautious. Surveys of fatally injured drivers show that when THC is detected in the blood, alcohol is almost always detected as well. For some individuals, marijuana may play a role in bad driving. The overall rate of highway accidents appears not to be significantly affected by marijuana's widespread use in society.

MYTH: MARIJUANA RELATED HOSPITAL EMERGENCIES ARE INCREASING, PARTICULARLY AMONG YOUTH. This is evidence that marijuana is much more harmful than most people previously believed.

FACT: Marijuana does not cause overdose deaths. The number of people in hospital emergency rooms who say they have used marijuana has increased. On this basis, the visit may be recorded as marijuana-related even if marijuana had nothing to do with the medical condition preceding the hospital visit. Many more teenagers use marijuana than use drugs such as heroin and cocaine. As a result, when teenagers visit hospital emergency rooms, they report marijuana much more frequently than they report heroin and cocaine. In the large majority of cases when marijuana is mentioned, other drugs are mentioned as well. In 1994, fewer than 2% of drug related emergency room visits involved the use of marijuana.

MYTH: MARIJUANA IS MORE POTENT TODAY THAN IN THE PAST. Adults who used marijuana in the 1960s and 1970s fail to realize that when today's youth use marijuana they are using a much more dangerous drug.

FACT: When today's youth use marijuana, they are using the same drug used by youth in the 1960s and 1970s. A small number of low-THC sample sized by the Drug Enforcement Administration are used to calculate a dramatic increase in potency. However, these samples were not representative of the marijuana generally available to users during this era. Potency data from the early 1980s to the present are more reliable, and they show no increase in the average THC content of marijuana. Even if marijuana potency were to increase, it would not necessarily make the drug more dangerous. Marijuana that varies quite substantially in potency produces similar psychoactive effects.

MYTH: MARIJUANA USE CAN BE PREVENTED. Drug education and prevention programs reduced marijuana use during the 1980s. Since then, our commitment has slackened, and marijuana use has been rising. By expanding and intensifying current anti-marijuana messages, we can stop youthful experimentation.

FACT: There is no evidence that anti-drug messages diminish young people's interest in drugs. Anti-drug campaigns in the schools and the media may even make drugs more attractive. Marijuana use among youth declined throughout the 1980s, and began increasing in the 1990s. This increase occurred despite young people's exposure to the most massive anti-marijuana campaign in American history. In a number of other countries, drug education programs are based on a "harm reduction" model, which seeks to reduce the drug-related harm among those young people who do experiment with drugs.

*Lynn Zimmer and John Morgan. Marijuana Myths, Marijuana Facts: A Review of the Scientific Evidence, (New York: The Lindesmith Center, 1997)."

http://www.drugpolicy.org/marijuana/factsmyths/

[Hendrik Van Dingenen]

Então, Cezar, desculpe ter lhe mal interpretado. Ainda não achei nada da Holanda ou outros países onde há uma política mais branda em relação ao tráfico, consumo e relações com criminalidade envolvendo maconha. O texo acima menciona algo, mas não tenho como checar as fonte, só comprando o livro.

Portanto, os seguintes itens são de particular interesse para suas perguntas:

"MYTH: MARIJUANA OFFENSES ARE NOT SEVERELY PUNISHED. Few marijuana law violators are arrested and hardly anyone goes to prison. This lenient treatment is responsible for marijuana continued availability and use.

FACT: Marijuana arrests in the United States doubled between 1991 and 1995. In 1995, more than one-half-million people were arrested for marijuana offenses. Eighty-six percent of them were arrested for marijuana possession. Tens of thousands of people are now in prison or marijuana offenses. An even greater number are punished with probation, fines, and civil sanctions, including having their property seized, their driver's license revoked, and their employment terminated. Despite these civil and criminal sanctions, marijuana continues to be readily available and widely used.

MYTH: MARIJUANA POLICY IN THE NETHERLANDS IS A FAILURE. Dutch law, which allows marijuana to be bought, sold, and used openly, has resulted in increasing rates of marijuana use, particularly in youth.

FACT: The Netherlands' drug policy is the most nonpunitive in Europe. For more than twenty years, Dutch citizens over age eighteen have been permitted to buy and use cannabis (marijuana and hashish) in government-regulated coffee shops. This policy has not resulted in dramatically escalating cannabis use. For most age groups, rates of marijuana use in the Netherlands are similar to those in the United States. However, for young adolescents, rates of marijuana use are lower in the Netherlands than in the United States. The Dutch people overwhelmingly approve of current cannabis policy which seeks to normalize rather than dramatize cannabis use. The Dutch government occasionally revises existing policy, but it remains committed to decriminalization."