SUNDAY SMOKERS HIT MORE POT HOLES

Marijuana smokers tend to drive more slowly, but that doesn't make them any
safer. In fact, they have trouble staying in their lanes and making quick
decisions when something unusual happens on the road, according to
researchers at Melbourne's Swinburne University.

They have found, however, that regular pot smokers are better drivers than
occasional users while under the drug's influence.

Katherine Papafotiou, of the university's drugs and driving unit, said 80
regular and non-regular marijuana smokers had volunteered for the trial,
which is still progressing.

Over six sessions they smoked marijuana joints and drank alcohol, then
jumped behind the wheel of a driving simulator.

"With marijuana alone, we found significant impairment in the individual
maintaining specified positions within designated traffic lanes . . . There
was a lot of weaving over barrier lines and solid lines when they were
intoxicated by cannabis in high doses," Dr Papafotiou said.

Non-regular users were more impaired, even though the level of THC, the
active ingredient in marijuana, was higher in regular users.

Occasional smokers also recorded a higher number of collisions and had
slower reaction times, which could be detrimental in emergency situations,
Dr Papafotiou said.

The conclusion, that regular users might be slightly more tolerant to the
impairing effects of marijuana, is just one problem in developing an
accurate roadside saliva test for all drug classes, which she said was at
least three years away.

"Saliva testing would be the simplest and least intrusive means of taking
roadside samples, but work still needs to be done on what levels of
different drugs in saliva actually means," she said.

"Cannabis has a high level in saliva because the THC stays in the mouth,
then metabolises. But saliva testing may give a more accurate test for
amphetamines."