IS LEGALIZATION THE ANSWER? WEIGHING THE MERITS OF MARIJUANA

ALCOHOL, TOBACCO HAVE DANGERS

Itai Danovitch lists health problems he says will be faced by new
users of marijuana in California if the drug is legalized.

No avalanche of new users occurred in The Netherlands or Portugal
when they decriminalized marijuana, or in U.S. states when they
legalized marijuana for medical purposes.

Nevertheless, for the sake of discussion, assume it happens in
California. Who would the new users be? What is their drug of choice
now? It is unlikely that the approximately 30 percent of Americans who
do not use alcohol or tobacco would begin to use marijuana because it
became legal.

Any new marijuana users would almost certainly come from users of
those drugs. Alcohol is addictive, associated with violence , destroys
organs and causes horrid, irreversible birth defects.

Tobacco is addictive and causes numerous lethal diseases.

By any scientific measure, marijuana is far less problematic than
either.

The 20th annual report of the California Research Advisory Panel
concluded, "An objective consideration of marijuana shows that it is
responsible for less damage to society and the individual than are
alcohol and cigarettes."

Danovitch's workload would be decreased, not increased, by any switch.

Suzanne Wills, Drug Policy Forum of Texas, Dallas