DEADLY DOPE

Thirty years ago, marijuana was thought to be harmless, a "soft" drug. Now,
say experts, it can be highly dangerous.

Christine Hogan reports.

GROWING up in the 1960s and 70s, few Australians at high school or
university could have avoided contact with dope.

There was always someone who could score a bag of weed for a party, a
friend who cultivated a couple of rangy Indian hemp plants on the terrace,
or a fan of Alice B Toklas who could bake hash brownies.

It was an element of a late-adolescent, usually university-based, rite of
passage. Sure, it was illegal: that was part of the point. But there seemed
more danger of dying from a heart attack trying to drawback on a lumpy,
slightly damp joint than there was of getting high.

Today things have changed. Marijuana is still illegal, still part of
risk-taking behaviour in adolescence. But the plant, how it is used or
abused, by whom and its effects are alarming health-care professionals, who
describe it as a huge problem, even an epidemic.

Modern technology in strain improvement and cultivation has overtaken
marijuana, dragging it into a new age.

The people who say "I smoked dope and it never did me any harm" are behind
the times, both in terms of the drug and the way it is used.

Drug experts make it clear that marijuana today is a very different plant
from that of yesterday. New, improved methods of growing the plant -
including hydroponic cultivation - are delivering a drug which has
(depending on whom you talk to) up to five, eight, even 20 times the level
of hallucinogens which were present in reefers from those old, high times.

"Plenty of people say it's a soft drug," said Sydney-based
psycho-physiologist John Anderson.

"But I reviewed the literature three years ago - that's around 1,800
articles - about the effects of marijuana, and what I read shocked the
socks off me."

THE debate, he argues, is polarised between the questions of use versus
abuse. The bottom line for the speeches he delivers to audiences across
Sydney is simple: "If you don't use, you can't abuse."

>From his private practice at Westmead, he said: "This is terribly
important. You'll get some people who will tell you marijuana USE is not
harmful. But the physiology says differently - its ABUSE is deadly dangerous.

"Cannabis is a depressant. Using it is like saying to a doctor 'I feel
terrific, can you give me a depressant?' Going to a dealer and buying dope
is exactly like saying 'I don't feel well, give me something to make me
feel worse'."

He has seen users as young as nine in his practice and reports that many
patients, as they try to break their cannabis dependence, say it is worse
than getting off heroin.

"Cannabis is fat-soluble," he said. "Its half-life in the body is eight
days. The adolescent brain metabolises chemicals more quickly than an
adult's and excretes them more slowly. It has an effect long after it's
taken."

The physiological effects of the drug on the brain - specifically on the
brains of adolescents - are also part of the focus for New Zealand-based
authors Tom Scott and Trevor Once.

Scott, a journalist and physiologist, gives talks at schools where he
compares the brain of an adolescent drug user with that of an Alzheimer's
sufferer.

In his introduction to their book, The Great Brain Robbery (What Everyone
Should Know About Teen-agers And Drugs), Scott comes straight to the point:
"Some social scientists, self-appointed experts and assorted lobbyists call
for more lenient attitudes to cannabis use, on the grounds that it is less
harmful than alcohol and marijuana is the exception to the rule that
recreational drugs have toxic side-effects.

"Until recently it was possible to defend cannabis on the grounds that the
jury was still out. Not any longer . . . the verdict is guilty."

Anecdotal evidence against dope mounts daily. Health-care professionals
report children under 10 with $100-a-week habits, an increase in
drug-induced psychoses, once-promising students in troughs of depression,
demotivated adolescents refusing to get out of bed and family break-ups
caused by the tensions that marijuana abuse introduces into a household.

"I see kids who tell me dope is harmless," said Melbourne-based health
psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg. "They say it's green, it's natural, it
grows in the ground, that it's a herb, for heaven's sake!"

He also treats the effects of that "herb".

"I see kids who present with cannabis dependence syndrome. They are
depressed, aggressive, intimidating of their parents, quick to anger, have
marked short-term memory loss, they're withdrawn and solitary, lack
motivation, they're persistently sad, unable to enjoy previously enjoyable
activities, complain of headaches and have low energy levels."

The first sign of marijuana abuse in his adolescent patients is poor
performance in school but that's a little way into the cannabis dependance
spiral.

"They get depressed, and they want to elevate their mood, so they smoke a
cone," he said. "When they come down, they feel more depressed ... and so
it goes. Marijuana doesn't seem to be physically addictive, but it does
create a psychological addiction."

Marijuana stands accused, linked with anything and everything (without much
research to back the claims in some cases) including asthma and low
testosterone levels, lowered IQ and youth unemployment, to being a factor
in road accidents involving young men and marital breakdown.

Raelene Allen, in Gone To Pot (What Every Parent Should Know About Young
People And Marijuana), her just-released guide to parents of drug-dependent
children, is direct: "You're facing the toughest battle of your life right
now, a battle which may have already cost you your marriage - or, at the
very least, put it at risk. This battle is affecting your work, home life,
your friendships and family relationships"

As well, dope is linked to some suicides among the young. A man whose son
killed himself recently blamed marijuana.

He told The Sun-Herald about the last, drug-numbed months of his son's life.

The son had kept his declining emotional state hidden from his family. His
father was certain his use of marijuana was a kind of self-medication for
depression, which masked the symptoms of mental illness and left it
undiagnosed and untreated for years.

"We feel we cannot let the important message that we have learnt from his
tragic death go unsaid," he told mourners at his son's funeral. "Marijuana
insidiously took control of his mind and over his body to the extent that
he could see no way out other than taking his own life."

How can a drug which in one generation was integral to the blissed-out,
laid-back hippie culture, suddenly turn into a menace to the young, a
threat to their immediate existence and their futures?

Tom Scott is blunt about the difference: "In my day, to get the effect from
a joint that you can get from spotting (heating cannabis oil on a knife or
foil over a flame then inhaling the fumes) you would have to have rolled
something the size of a pick handle."

The plants - because of better strains and improved cultivation (including
a growing use of hydroponics) - contain an increased amount of the active
hallucinogen in marijuana, THC (Delta-9-tetrahydrocannibinol).

DR Vaughan Rees, a senior research psychologist with the National Drug and
Alcohol Research Centre in Sydney, said: "Growers continue to improve the
strain. Better fertilisers are available and the plants are grown under
optimal conditions."

According to World Health Organisation data, the average THC content of
marijuana is 0.05 to 4 per cent. The flowering tops contain 7-l4pc, while
the concentration of THC in marijuana oil is l5-50pc.

Rees said dope buyers tended to shop for the very best.

"These people are real connoisseurs. They use dealers who supply them with
good material, they sniff before they buy," he said.

The dealers are keen to increase their market share with good quality gear.
Why not? This is the crop which, according to a report by Queensland's
Criminal Justice Committee, was second in value to the State's sugar
harvest. Nationwide, it's worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

Not only is the stuff used now better quality, it's used differently and
more often. For a start, marijuana smokers are younger.

Rees's figures indicate that at least one in three Australian adolescents
has tried the drug, that one in 10 uses it regularly - about once a month -
and that 4pc are cannabis dependent.

"The usage rates seem to have increased somewhat since the 60s and 70s, but
there's no reliable research. Usage varies, but heavy users might be doing
six cones a day," he said.

Some observers report use of up to 15-20 cones daily (about five to seven
joints).

So what is to be done? State shadow health minister Jillian Skinner is
pushing for greater focus on the question of demand. Softer drug laws in
South Australia and the ACT, in place for 10 years, had not led to a drop
in usage, she said.

"We have to - we must - tell kids the truth about this drug," she said.

Various initiatives are under way. In September, the Carr Government
announced the allocation of $75,000 for a new treatment program for young
people.

"The available evidence tends to explode the myth that cannabis is a
harmless drug," Health Minister Andrew Refshauge said. "The fact is that
cannabis is now more potent than ever and with higher addictive qualities."

In February, Victorian health authorities will conduct what is believed to
be a world first - a conference on cannabis and psychosis - - examining the
links between the drug and people with mental disorders, such as
schizophrenia and manic depression.

In March, The Great Brain Robbery co-author Trevor Grice, now lecturing in
the UK (and booked to address the House of Commons) will be in residence at
Riverview College for three weeks, giving seminars to students and their
parents.

PSYCHOLOGIST Michael Carr-Gregg is alarmed by what he sees in his practice
but said: "You have to keep it in perspective. About 8Opc of kids are happy
and well-adjusted. The problem is with the other 20pc."

"Cannabis dependence is impossible to predict. It doesn't happen to
everyone. We just don't know who is going to be affected."

"I tell my 19-year-old son that if he's going to make a decision about
smoking marijuana, I want him to make it fully informed about the possible
outcomes."

For further information, phone the Alcohol and Drug Information Service on
(02) 9361 6833 or 1800 422 599. Gone To Pot, by Roelane Allen, is published
by Vital Books (phnne 1800 242 912).

Alaraming side effects of dope

ACUTE: Reddening of the whites of the eyes, dry throat, elevated appetite.
Anxiety, panic and paranoia in naive users.

Short-term memory, concentration and psychomotor impairment. Increased risk
of an accident for drivers or operators of machinery. Possible psychotic
symptoms, such as delusions and hallucinations.

CHRONIC: Probable respiratory diseases, possible cannabis addiction. Memory
damage and decline in other intellectual skills. Increased risk of cancers
of aerodigestive tract. Increased risk of developing schizophrenia.
Increased risk of leukemia in offspring exposed in utero. Possible
chromosome damage. Increased risk of birth defects in women who use
cannabis during pregnancy. A marked decline in occupational performance in
adults and educational underachievement in children. Reduced white blood
cell production and impaired immune system. Reduced production of
reproductive hormones. Impaired ovulation, sperm production and libido.

>From The Great Brain Robbery ( What everyone should know about teenagers
and drugs) by Tom Scott and Trevor Grice, published by Allen & Unwin.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski