CAMPAIGN LINKS MARIJUANA, MENTAL ILLNESS

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Adolescents who use marijuana are more likely to
develop serious mental health problems, the government said Tuesday.

Past medical studies have also linked marijuana with a greater
incidence of mental disorders such as depression or schizophrenia. But
questions remain about whether people who smoke marijuana at a young
age are predisposed to mental disorders or whether the drug caused
those disorders.

"A growing body of evidence now demonstrates that smoking marijuana
can increase the risk of serious mental health problems," said John P.
Walters, director of the White House Office of Drug Control Policy.

Neil McKeganey, a Scotland-based researcher joining the Bush
administration in announcing a nationwide campaign, said that while it
was long assumed teens with psychological problems gravitated to
marijuana to self-medicate, growing evidence indicates that "marijuana
use itself is on some level causing the problems."

In Minnesota, some 77,000 youths ages 12 to 17 used marijuana in 2003,
the most recent year for which estimates are available, with 40,000
having smoked the drug in any given month, according to the Substance
Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, part of the
Department of Health and Human Services.

The campaign, including ads slated to run next week in newspapers
across the country, tells parents that youth are twice as likely to
develop depression later in life if they smoke marijuana on a weekly
basis and that marijuana users ages 12 to 17 are more than three times
as likely as non-users to have suicidal thoughts. The American
Psychiatric Association and a variety of other medical, behavioral and
school groups have signed on.

"Just because pot comes first doesn't mean pot is the cause --
depressed teens have a whole lot of things going on," said Mitch
Earleywine, an associate professor of psychology at the University of
Southern California and decriminalization advocate who wrote the 2002
book, Understanding Marijuana."

The campaign also cites an increased risk of schizophrenia among teen
marijuana users.

A well-regarded study out this year does show such a link, but
Earleywine said the same study also suggests that only a small
proportion of teens may be susceptible. First, he said, they must
inherit a certain gene from both parents; that rules out about three
of every four people. Second, they are chronic marijuana users. Of
them, about 15 percent develop psychotic symptoms apparently in
connection to the brain's reaction to marijuana.

He also said several studies suggest high schoolers and those younger
simply lack the ability to control their drug use. The younger kids
are when they start smoking marijuana, the more likely they are to
become dependent.

According to an analysis of FBI crime statistics by the
Washington-based think-tank, the Sentencing Project, the focus of the
drug war has shifted significantly over the past decade from hard
drugs to marijuana.

The study released Tuesday found that arrests for marijuana account
for nearly all of the increase in drug arrests seen during the 1990s.
The study also found that one in four people in state prisons for
marijuana offenses can be classified as a "low-level offender" and
estimates that $4 billion a year is spent on arresting and prosecuting
marijuana crimes.

Of some 700,000 marijuana arrests in 2002, 88 percent were for
possession, it said. And only one of every 18 of those arrests ended
in a felony conviction.

"Arresting record numbers of low-level marijuana offenders represents
a poor investment in public safety" and diverts resources from "more
serious crime problems," said Ryan King, co-author of the report.

The think-tank is a left-leaning group that advocates alternatives to
traditional imprisonment.