STUDY: MARIJUANA NO GATEWAY

Research Points To Flaw In U.S. Drug Prevention Policy

WASHINGTON -- Casting doubt on a basic principle of U.S. anti-drug policies,
an independent study concluded Monday that marijuana use does not lead
teenagers to experiment with hard drugs such as heroin or cocaine.

The study by Rand, a private, nonprofit research center, countered the
theory that marijuana acts as a so-called gateway drug to more harmful
narcotics, a key argument against legalizing pot in the United States.

"A lot of policy-makers and others have taken it for granted the gateway
effect is real. We have shown why this is not necessarily the case," said
Andrew Morral, lead author of the study.

Using data from the National Household Survey on Drug Abuse between 1982 and
1994, the study concluded that teenagers who used hard drugs were
predisposed to do so whether they tried marijuana first or not.

"Kids get their first opportunity to use marijuana years before they get
their first exposure to hard drugs," Morral said. "It is possible marijuana
is not a gateway drug. It's just the first thing kids often come across."

Half of U.S. teenagers had access to marijuana by age 16, Morral said, but
the majority had no exposure to cocaine, heroin or hallucinogens until they
were 20.

The study, published in the British journal Addiction, does not advocate
legalizing or decriminalizing marijuana, which has been linked to side
effects including short-term memory loss.

But given limited resources, Morral said, the U.S. government should
reconsider the prominence of marijuana in its war on drugs.

"If our model is correct, to a certain extent we are diverting resources
away from hard drug problems," he said.