LEGALIZATION NOT THE ANSWER

After billions of dollars have been spent fighting the epidemic of death
and disease caused by tobacco, a Senate committee now comes along and says
it's okay for 16-year-olds to legally buy and smoke pot?

Even worse, Senator Pierre-Claude Nolin, chairman of the Special Committee
on Illegal Drugs, says marijuana should be regulated by the state, "much as
we do for wine and beer."

Chamber of sober second thought, indeed.

The senators think that by legalizing marijuana Canada will save billions
in enforcement. While we agree it's time to review the criminal
consequences of marijuana use and possession, legalization is not the answer.

Leaving aside the topic of whether marijuana is a "gateway" to more serious
drugs like heroin and cocaine, it is not the harmless relaxant its users
claim. It contains more tar than tobacco and has a higher concentration of
cancer-causing substances, exposing users to a higher risk of lung and
respiratory diseases. It is also well known that marijuana causes
short-term memory loss and confusion.

Carleton University professor Peter Fried, who has studied the effects of
marijuana for more than 20 years, says there still isn't enough known to
safely legalize the drug, particularly its impact on memory and alterations
in brain function. He says "to pretend" mood alteration is marijuana's only
consequence is "naive."

The British Lung Foundation's chief executive warned only two months ago
that: "Many young people are simply not aware that smoking cannabis may put
them at increased risk of respiratory cancers and infections."

Dame Helena Shovelton added: "Fifty years ago, people thought smoking was a
good thing. Now it is described as a public health disaster -- we don't
want to see the same thing happen with cannabis."

At the very least, legalization of marijuana threatens to open the
floodgates on a potential new epidemic of disease at a time when tobacco
smoking is in steep decline.