MARIJUANA, TEEN MENTAL HEALTH LINKED

WASHINGTON -- Teens who use marijuana are more likely to develop serious
mental health problems, the government said Tuesday. And a private group
said law enforcement increasingly is targeting people who smoke and deal
the drug. Past medical studies have 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
already are predisposed to mental disorders, or whether the drug caused
those disorders.

Government officials say recent research makes a stronger case that smoking
marijuana is itself a causal agent in psychiatric symptoms, particularly
schizophrenia.

"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.

Administration officials pointed to a handful of studies to make their
case. One, from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services
Administration, found that adult marijuana smokers who began using the drug
before age 12 were twice as likely to have suffered a serious mental
illness in the past year as those who began smoking after 18.

The ratio was 21 percent to 10.5 percent. Those who first started as teens
also were at significantly higher risk.

In North Carolina, about 116,000 youths ages 12 to 17 used marijuana in
2003, the most recent year for which estimates are available, with 58,000
having smoked the drug in any given month, according to estimates by the
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, part of the
Department of Health and Human Services.

Also Tuesday, The Sentencing Project released a report that found that the
government's "war on drugs" has become the "war on drug" as police agencies
increasingly target marijuana.

Begun in the 1980s, the war on drugs was aimed at stopping large-scale
narcotics traffickers, particularly those selling cocaine. But since 1990
more of the focus has been on catching users and low-level dealers. And
more often than ever, the drug targeted is marijuana, according to the
group, a national nonprofit organization that works on judicial reform and
favors alternatives to jail.

Of about 700,000 marijuana arrests in 2002, 85.8 percent were for
possession, it said. 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.

King found that in 1992, arrests for heroin and cocaine comprised 55
percent of all drug arrests and marijuana 28 percent. A decade later,
heroin and cocaine arrests accounted for less than 30 percent of all
arrests, while marijuana's share had risen to 45 percent.

Jennifer deVallance, spokeswoman for the White House drug office, said
there are many reasons for the greater focus on marijuana. Among them:
Marijuana is the single largest drug of abuse in the nation, the strains
are more potent than ever and more is known about health dangers.