ACTUALLY, TOTH IS DEAD WRONG

THE EDITOR:

Re: 'Make pot pay for health,' Times, May 7.

In her column Christina Toth appears to be pushing for the legalization of
the dangerous drug marijuana.

There is a proposal in the Senate to legitimize, regulate and tax
marijuana.The marijuana lobby indicates that the legalization of marijuana
distribution would remove organized crime from the equation.There have been
two eye-opening articles about marijuana in the Reader's Digest.The first is
"Holland's Half-Baked Drug Experiment" in the August 2000 issue.

The second in the April 2004 issue of the Reader's Digest there is an
article "Marijuana's Loss of Innocence." The article in part states, "What
rarely gets coverage in the foreign media is how the Dutch experiment has
failed." Some of the points are that "in the 1990s the Netherlands became a
"coffee shop" [marijuana] capital of Europe. Estimated establishments 1,460
not including hundreds of illegal outlets, now the number has fallen to
about 800, attracting large numbers of drug tourists.

"The large-scale delivery of soft drugs to the coffee shops is largely under
the control of organized crime."

The Netherlands has produced dozens of drug barons, who grew extremely
wealthy from the illegal international trade in soft drugs. Organized
crime's grip on the drug world is much more powerful than supporters of
legalization think.

Some medical journals indicate that long-term cannabis use is more dangerous
than previously assumed, with problems such as schizophrenia, risk of
psychotic disorders, and that the drug contains more carcinogenic substances
than tobacco.

It was once commonly assumed that cannabis is not addictive, but now it
appears that even this assumption is incorrect. Of all drugs, cannabis is
the only one where the highest number of users are young people attending
school. Marijuana is a dangerous drug that should be eradicated. When we see
the scourge from tobacco and the abuse of alcohol, do we need another legal
dangerous drug?

I would hope not.

Eric Myrholm, Abbotsford