This commentary is by Kathryn Blume, communications director for NurseGrown Organics CBD in Underhill.
I can’t stop thinking about a recent statement from State Rep. Arthur Peterson, R-Clarendon, spoken in the context of the latest wave of legislation to create a legal cannabis marketplace in Vermont. Rep. Peterson said, “As you all know, cannabis has THC in it, which is a dangerous drug.”
This is the kind of misinformed remark, coming out of decades of successful anti-cannabis propaganda and legislation, which would be merely sad if it also weren’t historically rooted in systemic racism, white supremacy, and the amassing of political power and control.
Cannabis is not a dangerous drug. In fact, over the decades, there have been at least half a dozen government-commissioned scientific studies (not just in the U.S.) to determine whether or not cannabis is dangerous. One of the most recent was the Shafer Commission, appointed by the Nixon administration.
Every single time, each study concluded that cannabis isn’t dangerous — including the Shafer Commission’s report, which said cannabis did not “cause widespread danger to society.” And every single time, the relevant governmental body ignored the report and declared cannabis dangerous anyway.
In the U.S., we even went so far as to declare cannabis a Schedule 1 drug, meaning that it has “no currently accepted medical use in the United States, a lack of accepted safety for use under medical supervision, and a high potential for abuse.”
This means we consider cannabis to be more dangerous than Dilaudid, OxyContin, morphine, opium, codeine and phenobarbital — which are all Schedule 2. This is tragic, given that more than 81,000 Americans died from a drug overdose in 2020, and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has confirmed that synthetic opioids are primarily responsible for those deaths, not cannabis.
Cannabis has been unfairly maligned and criminalized for decades, and upwards of 40,000 Americans — mostly black and brown people — have been imprisoned for cannabis-related offenses, and entire communities decimated, as part of the politically motivated War On Drugs.
I have a lot of experience with cannabis. For one thing I’m allergic to alcohol, so it’s my recreational substance of choice. But to be honest, that’s been the least important part of my relationship to the plant. It’s also been an invaluable medicine, helping with everyday issues like menstrual cramps, hot flashes, headaches, insomnia, muscular pain and mood elevation.
More significantly, though, five years ago I got hit with a burst appendix and sepsis. I was hospitalized for two weeks, and have spent years in recovery due to the immense impact from that experience, as well as an undiagnosed — and only recently repaired — incisional hernia.
During my hospitalization, and when I was released, I was given a host of opioid pain meds, for which I got no instructions other than how much to take and how frequently to take them. I had all manner of unpleasant side effects and ended up spending two solid weeks in withdrawal trying to get off them.
I was incredibly fortunate to be able to take the time to lie there and suffer what I can only describe as nonstop, whole-being pain. If I’d had kids or a job, I imagine I’d have given up and gone back on the pain meds in the hopes of being able to get off them later. I have no doubt that would have been an even worse path.
Never once, in all my years of partaking in cannabis, have I had the kind of side effects and withdrawal the way I did with opioids.
That’s not to say cannabis isn’t a potent plant. It is, and THC is a powerful substance — which is why over 5,000 Vermonters and over 5 million Americans who suffer from everything from cancer to MS to chronic pain to Parkinson’s to PTSD are legally registered medical cannabis patients. Remember that during the pandemic, medical cannabis was so important to the people who take it that dispensaries were considered essential businesses.
And yes, it is possible to consume so much you don’t feel well and get disoriented, confused and paranoid. It’s happened to me, and many people, and the public definitely needs to be educated about consumption, because it’s certainly not a fun experience, and can be scary for the uninformed.
Also, some folks who have a propensity toward mental illness should definitely not consume cannabis. But that’s a very small percentage of the population, and it doesn’t make THC dangerous across the board in the way that alcohol and opioids are dangerous.
That’s because the neurological receptors for cannabinoids aren’t located in the part of the brainstem (the medulla oblongata) that controls breathing, heart rate, and blood pressure. So, unlike with alcohol or heroin, you can’t consume too much cannabis and have it stop your heart or your breathing.
Honestly, I don’t care whether or not someone wants to consume cannabis. Each to their own. But it’s truly unfortunate that anyone would think it’s dangerous. There are many things in the world to genuinely fear, but THC isn’t one of them.
