Three years after the legalization of recreational marijuana in Canada, researchers say the change has sparked “partial success” – but information on the impact of marijuana on health is still needed.
Michael G. McKinley of McMaster University in Hamilton Jason Bussey, associate director of the DeGroot Center for Medicine’s Cannabis Research, said, “Data is still coming out on conclusions about this big social experiment.
The federal government legalized recreational marijuana in October 2018, opening the door to a lucrative market for marijuana control and sales while reducing the impact of black market sales.
While the trend suggests positive changes from the illicit market, Busse says there is little information to suggest that legalization has any impact on Canadians ’health.
He spoke Nationwide inspection Host Ian Hanomansing on what data is required. Here’s part of that conversation.
What do you think the government has accomplished with legalization?
There have been partial successes and the jury is still gathering more information. The problem is that most Canadians used recreational marijuana before it was legalized. Somewhere between 15 and 20 percent approved marijuana use last year.
The idea of legalizing it is to turn that money from the black market into a fairly proper source of income [and] To make another controlled substance available to the person you are interested in, such as alcohol or tobacco, to standardize and control the product to provide it in a safe fashion.
So there is little migration from the illegal market. Still, about 50 percent of Canadians use marijuana, which authorizes obtaining some time off from illegal sources.
In terms of whether or not we see some increase in health care issues, we are not sure. There is not much data to suggest that we are seeing a large increase in motor vehicle accidents, early-onset psychosis among adolescents and emerging adults.
There have been some signs of an increase in emergency department visits, such as cannabis hyperemesis syndrome, which occurs when you take more than one THC at a time.
Let’s talk about that 50 percent number – those 50 percent cannabis purchases seem to be happening in the store, which means the other 50 percent is going on the black market. Why do so many people still refuse to buy it from a regulated system – or are reluctant?
It takes a while for people to change their purchase to a new source. So you are looking at changes from 2019 to 2020. Respondents to the National Cannabis Survey suggest that immigration to that legal market has increased.
But as you have noticed, there is a huge amount that is not there yet. Some people talk about price issues. Some people talk about quality issues, and you’ve heard from one of the callers before.
There is little variation in the products available through legal means. The dishes are only available by 2019 – a year has been given to bring them.
So as time goes on, I think we will see increased migration into the legal market. You’ll still see some holdouts until the illegal market offers more variety, and in some cases, lower price points to get the same products.
From a public health perspective, what concerns you most when we are here three years into the process of legalizing Canada?
We would like to see the net benefits outweigh the net damage to make this product widely available to Canadians.
The federal government has downloaded more responsibility on individual territories and territories, and you see some differences in the age of allowable use.
Some of the concerns about setting this kind of age limit come from a position paper published by the Canadian Psychiatric Association in 2017, and they acknowledge that marijuana use is linked to neuropsychological problems and, once again, early psychosis. So he was pushing for a minimum age of 21. And of course, for the simple reason that a large proportion of individuals who use marijuana are in that younger age range, it is not fully implemented.
As we seek to reconcile bringing the largest population we are currently using [into the legal market], We have to wonder if it could have some potential consequences.
So we have to keep collecting data – and I think the government is doing a great job in many cases – monitoring recreational psychotropic products to see if there is an increase in motor vehicle accidents or other areas you can imagine.
Written by Jason Vermes. Produced by Abby Pleiner. This questionnaire has been edited for length and clarity.