METH MAYHEM: LA\’s homeless meth addiction epidemic fueled by CJNG drug cartel, enabled by Prop 47, DEA says
LOS ANGELES – The meth addiction epidemic gripping the homeless community on the streets of Los Angeles is being fueled by Mexico’s Jaliso New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and is being enabled by California’s Prop 47, the DEA said in an explosive interview with FOX 11.
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But most troublesome to Bodner is the amount of CJNG drugs finding their way to Los Angeles, where the cartel has an extensive network. It’s not unusual for Bodner to seize one hundred, two hundred, three hundred, or four hundred pounds of meth at one location. Bodner says LA’s street gangs then act as intermediaries with the cartel, breaking up the meth and putting it out to street dealers. Those street dealers then prey upon the addicts in Los Angeles.
The results have been devastating.
FOX 11 filmed video on one afternoon across the street from LAPD’s Central Division in downtown Los Angeles, showing multiple addicts shooting up or smoking meth in public. In one video, a man approached another man who was smoking meth, asked him for some, took a hit, and then kept going on his way. A hooded drug dealer also approached the FOX 11 crew, offering to sell crystal meth.
One homeless man told FOX 11 he used to be an addict but quit because he had a stroke. He showed FOX 11 numerous staph infections all over his body and said he’s been living on the streets for 2 years.
Bodner tells FOX 11 he believes California’s Prop 47 is playing right into the cartel’s hands. Prop 47 changed drug possession from a felony to a misdemeanor, which he thinks is enabling this addiction cycle.
\”There’s no reason to be afraid of shooting up in public. There’s no motivation to go to treatment. They used to be given a choice, do you want to go to jail, do you want a felony conviction, or do you want treatment?\” Bodner added, \”Now, they get a ticket, tear it up, throw it away, and they’re using drugs the same day. So, it has not worked.\”
For complete article https://www.foxla.com/news/meth-mayhem-las-homeless-meth-addiction-epidemic-fueled-by-cjng-drug-cartel-enabled-by-prop-47-dea-says
(This was \’all going to vanish\’ with Legalization…\’They\’ said so, over and over! Another broken promise from the addiction for profit pot-industry!)
Concerns raised over illegal marijuana grow operations.
- KEV KURDOGHLIAN – MAY 25, 2021
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“These are international, transnational criminal organizations that are getting free land, free water, growing illegal marijuana over several acres,” Garcia wrote in a recent statement. “There are now thousands of these illegal grows – the problem has grown exponentially just in the last two months.”
Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, whose 5th District includes the Santa Clarita Valley, has been working on this issue over the past year, according to Christina Mesesan, the supervisor’s justice deputy. She said area residents alerted Barger’s office of the illegal activity.
“With lockdown and with people not really emerging from their homes, it really provided the perfect opportunity for the growers to come in and essentially squat on private property and cultivate their marijuana there,” she said.
The area’s climate and open terrain make it appealing for growers, though illegal grow operations exist across the state.
“We’ve really recognized the difficulty on having a long-term effect on these growers by arresting them,” Mesesan said. “As of this point, what we can arrest them on is water theft, and water theft is actually quite difficult to kind of hold somebody behind bars for a long time.”
Water theft resulting from illegal marijuana grows may reduce water pressure levels to the point where residents may need to boil their water, she said, noting that Barger’s office is searching for immediate and long-term solutions.
From a legislative standpoint, Barger is thinking about drafting of or supporting legislation addressing environmental impact.
“A lot of people don’t realize the environmental impacts that comes from this because the chemicals used to cultivate the marijuana to create the edibles, to garner it down to the ways in which people consume it, leaves a lot of chemicals behind,” said Mesesan. “There’s illegal dumping. It’s poisoning the ground. It’s poisoning the groundwater.”
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On the enforcement side, Barger has participated in working groups with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, which have faced a challenging reality in the field, Mesesan said.
“The Sheriff’s Department is doing everything that they possibly can,” she said. “This is really just a situation where they are undeniably outnumbered. And the reality of the fact is the amount of sheriff’s deputies that we have in that area is not a lot.”
The county has also worked with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which supports municipalities with grants to suppress and eradicate illegal marijuana operations.
“We do have active marijuana investigations going and we try to focus on the most egregious ones where it’s interstate trafficking or a large-scale organization where there’s other criminal violations going on,” said DEA Special Agent Bill Bodner.
The DEA devotes most of its staff resources to investigations of methamphetamine, fentanyl overdoses and counterfeit prescription drug pills coming into the U.S., making it harder to address the rapid growth of illegal marijuana grows in California.
For complete article go to Concerns raised over illegal marijuana grow operations (signalscv.com)
Drugs, Homelessness & a Growing Public Health Disaster
by PAULA D. GORDON
By many criteria, 21st-century California is both the poorest and the richest state in the union. Almost a quarter of the population lives below the poverty line. Another fifth is categorized as near the poverty level — facts not true during the latter 20th century. A third of the nation’s welfare recipients now live in California. The state has the highest homeless population in the nation (135,000). About 22 percent of the nation’s total homeless population reside in the state — whose economy is the largest in the U.S., fueling the greatest numbers of American billionaires and high-income zip codes…..
If someone predicted half a century ago that a Los Angeles police station or indeed L.A. City Hall would be in danger of periodic, flea-borne infectious typhus outbreaks, he would have been considered unhinged. After all, the city that gave us the modern freeway system is not supposed to resemble Justinian’s sixth-century Constantinople. Yet typhus, along with outbreaks of infectious hepatitis A, are in the news on California streets. The sidewalks of the state’s major cities are homes to piles of used needles, feces, and refuse. Hygienists warn that permissive municipal governments are setting the stage — through spiking populations of history’s banes of fleas, lice, and rats — for possible dark-age outbreaks of plague or worse.
– Victor Davis Hanson, “America’s First Third-World State,” National Review, June 2019
Conditions of squalor, which may be found in a refugee settlement or on the streets of a third world country, appear to be rapidly increasing in certain places in the United States over the past several years. This phenomenon is evident not only in a growing number of cities in California — including San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, Los Angeles, and San Diego — but in cities in Oregon, Washington State, Colorado, and elsewhere. During the past several years, similar signs of deteriorating conditions have also become increasingly evident in New York City and Washington, D.C.
The more people attracted to these locales, the more overwhelmed law enforcement and all social service providers have become. As a result, the attractions for some to these locales may include being able to obtain, use, and possess drugs, including marijuana, without risking arrest or interference. This raises many questions for preparedness professionals, which include:
- What might some of the reasons be for these increases in the homeless population, especially in these locales?
- Why would those who are homeless gravitate to some areas rather than others?
- Why would there be a notable increase in certain places in the last few years?
- Might many, if not most of the people gravitating to these locations do so for some of the same common reasons?
- Might they be attracted to locations where they are able to get by without the undue interference of law enforcement and other government authorities?
- Might many of the now homeless who gravitated to these locales have done so, at least in part, because law enforcement no longer enforces what in the past would have been treated as infractions of the law?
Surely not all homeless persons use drugs and not all are mentally ill. Living in squalor, however, can certainly take a toll. Homeless persons can find themselves in a downward spiral. If they had not used mood-altering and psychoactive substances before, they might well begin to use them after they enter the ranks of the homeless. Users or would-be users living in jurisdictions where marijuana use was illegal and where marijuana and other drug laws were previously strictly enforced, might well be attracted to locales where marijuana possession and use are legal and readily obtainable or where such drug use is no longer strictly enforced.
Lessons Learned From Colorado & Seattle
Users and would-be users may also have been attracted to locations where it is possible to use drugs of all kinds without fear of penalty or jail. This appears to have been the case in Colorado. The increase in the number of homeless and in the number of encampments of homeless have been noticeable since the legalization of marijuana in Colorado in 2014. So too has been the increase in polydrug use in general and in opioid use and addiction.
In October 2016, Dr. Karen Randall, an emergency room physician in Pueblo, Colorado, tells a heart-rending story of what has happened in Pueblo since the legalization of marijuana. There has been an influx of homeless, accompanied by widespread abuse by many of these non-residents of the social service system. Some of the most “enterprising” of these homeless individuals have admitted that they have advertised on Craigslist in order to find a local resident whom they can pay in order to use that resident’s address. Thereby, they establish a “faux” residency and become eligible for benefits and social services that they would not otherwise be eligible to receive.
There was an influx of people coming from out of state to Colorado beginning at the time that marijuana was legalized in that state. This pattern may be repeated elsewhere where drug laws and their enforcement has radically changed or ceased. Understanding what happened in Pueblo may well help explain similar kinds of problems involving the growing number of homeless in California and elsewhere.
Perhaps drug use, not just of marijuana, but of all psychoactive drugs and opiates has increased at least in part to the changing laws concerning marijuana use. Christopher Rufo of the Discovery Institute Center on Wealth and Poverty authored a report in December 2019, entitled “Compassion With Results: Action Plan on Homelessness for American Cities,” which addresses the impact of changing laws. He states that “many cities have pursued a policy of decriminalization that has led to a significant increase in public disorder.” In that report, Rufo also quotes a former Seattle crime adviser Scott Lindsey who reflects as follows on the connection between “street disorder” and drugs in Seattle:
The increase in street disorder is largely a function of the fact that [hardcore drug] possession has been largely legalized in the city over the past several years. The unintended consequence of that social policy effort has been to make Seattle a much more attractive place to buy and sell hardcore drugs.
A reduced effort on the part of law enforcement or laxity with respect to law enforcement can be found in the disinclination of law enforcement to enforce laws on the books regarding everything from panhandling, to sleeping on the sidewalk or in a public park, to pitching a tent on a sidewalk, to urinating and defecating in a public place. Crimes — including home and car break-ins, and thefts — are on the increase, contributing greatly to the degradation of the quality of life in the community.
Legalized and “legitimized” marijuana use and the poly drug use that has been associated with it are major contributing factors in the growth of conditions similar to refugee camps, massive homelessness, mental illness, violence, crime, and a myriad of health and safety problems that are now found in once beautiful cities and areas of the country. Emergency services are being called on increasingly to address this spreading combined “epidemic” of drug use, addiction, and homelessness. As a result, law enforcement, medical services, and social services are becoming overwhelmed as well.
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©iStock.com/MattGush
Randall is one of a group of several hundred Colorado physicians who have been on the “front lines” of what has happened since marijuana was legalized in Colorado. Many of these physicians have told their stories in what is known as the Code Red series of video presentations. In one of the presentations, Randall provides a vivid picture of the effect that the legalization of marijuana has had in Colorado and on Pueblo in particular. She describes the impact on the growth of refugee camp-like settlements of homeless. She notes that large numbers of people began to move into the Pueblo area from other states since 2014, many drawn by the fact that marijuana use had become legal and could be legally obtained. Some were drawn by the possibility of employment opportunities in the industry.
Randall tells of the increasing numbers of patients in the emergency room suffering from psychotic breaks, some of whom have needed to be restrained owing to their violent behavior. She has also discussed a condition known as “cannabis hyperemesis syndrome” (CHS), which she has treated numerous times, a condition increasingly suffered by chronic marijuana users. CHS has the nickname of “scromiting” because the condition typically involves severe vomiting that is so painful that those experiencing the pain scream uncontrollably. Those developing this condition can become seriously dehydrated. In a few cases, CHS has resulted in death.
A successful treatment of CHS can be a very curious one; one such treatment involves the closing down of the pain receptors by having the individual take extended long hot showers. The individual must also stop using marijuana for the condition to improve. This can be difficult to accomplish since some users reject the possibility that their use of marijuana is responsible for their condition. Indeed, thousands of dollars may be spent on medical workups when the person suffering from CHS rejects the diagnosis or when those treating the individual have not recognized or identified the cause of the symptoms.
Many marijuana users have long ago decided that marijuana is a “relatively” harmless drug, reasoning that, “after all, it is a natural substance.” Jimson weed, hemlock, ricin, and belladonna are also natural substances, but would never be taken for recreational purposes. Many users of marijuana are not inclined to believe that marijuana use could trigger health problems such as scromiting. The vaping of Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) can have the most serious health consequences, with many hundreds being hospitalized and a growing number of deaths occurring.
Marijuana users can readily purchase marijuana from other sources than the “legal” state-licensed dispensaries. To save money, users may begin to purchase their drugs from the black market. It should be noted that the activities of drug cartels and the black market have exploded in jurisdictions — including Colorado, California, Oregon, and the State of Washington — that all have “legal” licensed dispensaries. A reason that drug use of all kinds has exploded is that black marketers can easily undercut the prices of “legitimate” dispensaries. In her 2014 article for the AP entitled “Legal pot in Colorado hasn’t stopped black market,” reporter Sadie Gurman describes an account of this phenomena. There have been a number of documentaries on the topic as well.
As users become customers of black marketers, they can be and are too often introduced to a variety of other drugs, including methamphetamine, cocaine, and opioids. Indeed, black marketers may purposely sell heroin at lower prices than marijuana, this way ensuring that their client becomes a chronic user. This has increased substantially not only the number of marijuana addicts, but the number of polydrug users, and opioid addicts as well.
Call to Action
The nation’s drug crisis is having demonstrable ill-effects on the health and safety in many areas in the United States. These patterns have become increasingly apparent in jurisdictions where:
- Marijuana use has been legalized;
- Drug use of marijuana and other drugs is no longer being treated as an illegal activity; and
- Users are not remanded to drug court-type programs or other programs that provide education, counselling, treatment, or rehabilitation services to enable them to cease their drug-taking behavior and their reliance on drugs.
The “cure,” if there can be one, may well require a “full court press” on the part of all relevant institutions. Efforts to turn around current trends will require that all in the community and those at all levels of government in roles of responsibility for the health, safety, and welfare of citizens do their jobs. Indeed, a multi-disciplinary approach involving a multi-pronged strategy is needed that is designed to make inroads into the drug use and addiction problems of the homeless person and to help those involved in drug-taking behavior to reorient their lives and become fully functioning human beings.
What has happened in parts of Pueblo, Colorado, can be seen as a microcosm of what is happening in many cities in the nation. The result has been the establishment of refugee-camp-type situations, where illnesses are rampant and squalor is widespread. Conditions can be likened to a war zone or the aftermath of a major natural calamity that has resulted in widespread devastation. They can be likened, as Victor Davis Hanson has pointed out, to life in third world countries.
The first step in successfully addressing a problem is to identify the factors fueling the problem. Emergency management and emergency services are on the front lines of protecting public health and safety and observe these factors every day. To stop this “epidemic,” it is critical for those on the front lines to work with decision-makers and inform them concerning the nature and scope of the crisis, with emphasis on the following:
- The gravity of this public health and safety disaster is threatening to spread further in the nation.
- The recent rapid threat negatively affects the quality of life and public safety in metropolitan areas.
- Practices that are being used by those illicitly growing marijuana contribute measurably to the degradation of the environment. “Legal” as well as illegal marijuana “grows” are having a devastating impact on the nation’s natural resources, including depletion of already scarce water and pollution of natural resources and destruction of wildlife.
- Connections exist between the widening use of drugs, laxity regarding addressing the problem of drugs, and diminishing attention to enforce the most basic laws that help sustain a first world quality of life.
It may be up to those in emergency management and emergency services to help policymakers understand the necessity of implementing a full-court press approach to addressing the growing crisis. In this way, significant steps may be taken that result in safeguarding the health and safety of the public and getting people off the streets and on their feet again.
Also See
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Paula D. Gordon, Ph.D. is an educator, writer, and consultant, based in Washington, D.C. She has had responsibilities in the federal government for coordinating interagency and intergovernmental efforts and directing or taking part in projects in various fields, including drug abuse prevention and emergency management and homeland security. These assignments have included the National Institute for Mental Health, the National Science Foundation, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and the Environmental Protection Agency. In addition, she has served as an adjunct professor and practitioner faculty member for The George Washington University and Johns Hopkins University, among other institutions. She is currently developing and teaching online courses for Auburn University Outreach on topics including the drug crisis as a national public health disaster, the effects and impacts of marijuana use and legalization, and emergency management and homeland security. Her websites include the following: http://GordonDrugAbusePrevention.com, http://GordonPublicAdministration.com, and http://GordonHomeland.com (e-mail: [email protected]).
Original Post Drugs, Homelessness & a Growing Public Health Disaster | Domestic Preparedness
High-potency pot hurt my son, forced my family from Pueblo – Aubree Adams Guest columnist
My family moved to Pueblo in 2005 to be closer to family. We loved the people, weather, beauty and close access to hiking and the mountains.
Many families were moving to what I thought was Colorado’s best-kept secret.
We raised our kids in Pueblo, got involved with community organizations and I worked as a licensed physical therapist assistant at several well-known local clinics. I got to know the people and heart of Pueblo through my jobs.
In 2014, the commercialization of THC, the mood-altering chemical in marijuana, changed Pueblo.
We saw the influx of homelessness, crime, and kids dying from suicide. Still, I never thought this policy would affect my family.
That year, my son started using marijuana edibles.
He had access to these products at school and homes in the neighborhood because 18-year-olds could easily get medical marijuana cards.
We did not know he was using marijuana because the industry makes products in deceptive forms to disguise use.
By 2015, my son was irrational and paranoid, repeating things that did not make sense. I now know this was a psychotic break; one night he was so violent that his brother ran barefoot through the snow to get away.
He attempted suicide and was hospitalized. When discharged, he was still suicidal. I took him back to the E.R. where I was told “it’s just marijuana” and we were sent home again.
Within a few days, my son was hospitalized in a different town because
there were no available beds in Pueblo.
He told me he was using dabs, and he knew they were making him feel crazy. He was trying to quit. He described dabs as “crack weed”.
Through research, I found out dabs are highly concentrated THC. I was horrified that such a dangerous drug could be legal. I read the science of marijuana and how it increases the risk for suicide and psychosis.
I volunteered my family for crisis intervention with the department of social services because I couldn’t find treatment.
My son had developed the pediatric disease of addiction and, by the next year, he also was using meth and heroin.
My son allows me to tell his story because he wants the nation to know that marijuana is harmful and can change you forever with delusional thinking, hallucinations, and an increased risk for suicide, depression, and addiction.
Over one out of four Pueblo high school students use marijuana now, according to state youth surveys — the highest rate in the state and exceeding even Denver. Statewide, the percentage of youth who dab and vape more potent products has increased rapidly.
For complete article go to Pueblo Chieftain
Aubree Adams
Former Colorado mom and mom for kids in recovery
P: 719-250-5740 W: everybrainmatters.org
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Cannabis ‘gravest threat’ to mental health of young people
Drug potency and misconception as harmless are ‘devastating’, psychiatrists warn…
May 4, 2021, Paul Cullen Health Editor
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Cannabis: Psychiatric services could be “overrun” by a surge in young people needing treatment of mental issues linked to the drug.
Cannabis is the “gravest threat” to the mental health of young people in Ireland, a psychiatrists’ group has warned, with an estimated 45,000 15-34 year olds now meeting the criteria for cannabis dependence.
A combination of increasingly potent strains of the drug and a “widespread conception” among the public that it is generally harmless has had “devastating effects”, the College of Psychiatrists of Ireland said.
While calling on the Government to conduct an urgent review of cannabis use and related harms, the college has begun its own information campaign amid concerns that psychiatric services could be “overrun” by a surge in young people needing treatment of mental issues linked to the drug.
The college says there were 877 admissions in 2019 to medical hospitals in Ireland with a cannabis-related diagnosis, four times the figure for 2005.
‘Perfect storm’
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“As many as one in three young people who use cannabis weekly or more often will likely become addicted,” said Dr Gerry McCarney, a consultant child and adolescent addiction psychiatrist.
“When you consider how potent the drug has become in recent years, it is obvious we are facing a perfect storm which has the potential to overrun our psychiatric services.”
The average age at which children start to try cannabis is 12-14, with many going on to “almost daily” use, and those requiring referral to mental health services aged 15-16 on average, Dr McCarney said.
However, some children as young as seven to eight were “dabbling” in the drug, he added, while 11 year olds have required treatment.
Psychosis and depression
“The earlier you start, the greater the potential risk,” he said. “This is a critical phase of young people’s lives, a time of learning and the opening of career opportunities. You don’t get that time back again if it’s lost to cannabis misuse.”
Mental health issues associated with cannabis use include psychosis, depression, anxiety disorders and suicidal behaviour. These have been exacerbated by rising levels of THC, the psychoactive part of the drug, in cannabis in recent years.
College president Dr William Flannery said cannabis use was increasing but “there is still a general feeling among the public that the drug is mostly harmless”. “This conception needs to be challenged at every turn because psychiatric services are under huge pressure due to this problem.”
For complete story go to https://www.irishtimes.com/news/health/cannabis-gravest-threat-to-mental-health-of-young-people-1.4554489
WhoaDude-the-book — Harmful Health effects of Cannabis (whoadude-the-book.com)
Do you or does someone close to you smoke Weed or use Cannabis products? Are you wondering about the down side, about the health risks?
With the rush to legalize marijuana, it has been lost in the haze that marijuana is a psychoactive drug. A drug that can lead to serious health problems in some people, not everybody. Most vulnerable are adolescents, young adults, and pregnant women, but heavy or chronic use of Weed can also lead to dependence and health complications for people at all ages. Be informed, what you don’t know can hurt you.
About the Author
Kevin G. Becker received a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in 1989 in Molecular Biology and Genetics. He spent 30 years as a scientist in the Intramural Research Program of the U.S. National Institutes of Health. This included postdoctoral fellowships at the National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development, Neurological Diseases and Stroke, and The National Human Genome Research Institute. He was a Staff Scientist at the National Institute on Aging for over 20 years. He has published on a broad range of topics including aging, autoimmune disease including multiple sclerosis, autism, bioinformatics, gene expression, genetics, immunity, metabolism and neuroscience. At the NIA he often collaborated with investigators from the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He is an author or co-author on over 300 peer reviewed scientific publications. To get the book, Click Here
And for a poignant Pot post-mortem….
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CHILD ABUSE AND NEGLECT DEATHS CONTINUE — HIGHEST COUNT IN PENNSYLVANIA
Parents Opposed to Pot cites 256 marijuana-related child deaths in a plea not to legalize MJ.
MERRIFIELD, VA, US, March 30, 2021 – As New York and Virginia legislators move closer to marijuana legalization this week, they should consider the traffic deaths of children whose caregivers drove after using marijuana. In the Bronx, New York, Sincere Mitchell, 8, died in a crash when his father was drunk and high on THC. In Virginia, Brian Cameron Hughes died after his mother’s boyfriend crashed, admitting he had smoked marijuana before driving.
“Those pushing for cannabis legalization want to keep marijuana users from getting arrest records. But legislators need to consider the potential loss of life from THC-impaired drivers on our roads,” explains Corinne Gasper, who lost her daughter to a speeding driver with high levels of THC in his system.
Currently, law enforcement cannot adequately test or prove THC-impairment of motorists. Parents Opposed to Pot (PopPot.org), a Merrifield, VA, non-profit, finds news reports of at least 115 U.S. traffic deaths in which marijuana is the only impairing substance and many more deaths with marijuana and other drug mixtures.
Poppot.org also tracks child abuse and neglect deaths related to parent and caregiver pot use, finding 256 deaths in news reports since the first two states voted to legalize pot in 2012. This count includes deaths of 29 children that occurred because a parent or caregiver drove while impaired by marijuana and 23 who died from infant THC exposure, mainly in infants.
Marijuana, the most common drug found in child abuse or neglect deaths
Parents Opposed to Pot’s tracking is informal, based on how much information gets reported by the press. The federal government requires all states to report child fatalities related to abuse or neglect. In three states that report on specific drugs connected to such deaths, Texas, Arizona, and Florida — not states with the highest rate of pot use— marijuana consistently comes up as the number one drug, more than alcohol.
In Colorado, a father, Isaac Bullard was recently sentenced for the death of his 23-month son. After “dabbing” high potency pot one morning, he forgot to put his son in the car and backed out over him.
When PopPot.org first started tracking child abuse deaths linked to pot, Colorado and California led in the tally of deaths from late 2012 to 2015. Today, Pennsylvania leads Poppot’s count, with 25 deaths, most of them having occurred recently. Since medical marijuana was argued in the state legislature (the bill passed in April 2016), it seems that more children have been born to mothers who used during pregnancy or post-partum. Mothers using marijuana during pregnancy or postpartum pose many risks to their children, including low birth weight and breathing issues. Twelve of the Pennsylvania deaths involve THC exposure.
Marijuana impairs memory and executive functioning which can lead to poor judgement. Other side effects include: distortion of time, addiction, paranoia, anxiety and mood disorders. The worst outcome is psychosis which, if left untreated or not resolved by quitting drug use, can become schizophrenia. An adult who is high or in psychosis may fail to give adequate supervision, or may act violently towards a child.
Fires, drownings, hot cars
Eighteen children died in fires related to parents using pot. Three sets of twins, all toddlers, died in fires, either because their moms left home and abandoned them in order to acquire marijuana, or, in one case of a father given court-ordered visitation, the parent fell asleep after smoking it.
California has reported many instances of child endangerment when children were present at home marijuana labs, called butane hash oil labs. Two of 18 children who died by fire involved BHO explosions and at least three children had to be treated for BHO burns on more than half of their bodies.
Twenty-five children died from drowning, 8 of them in Florida. Adult marijuana use was a likely factor in at least 21 hot car deaths of infants and toddlers since 2013.
Parents Opposed to Pot is a 501c3 educational nonprofit based in northern Virginia. Contact at 773-322-7523 or visit the website, poppot.org, Facebook @poppotorg.
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For more Cannabis & Child Neglect
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Day 5: Pot Profits Adults But the Young Are Harmed Most
We are letting pot profiteers prey on our teens/young adults and they and their families suffer
Excerpt: \”In my son’s two-plus years of treatment in three different states [and $250k], there were only two other young men of color in any of the programs. My son is back in Colorado where he lives independently and works full time in the meat-packing industry. He recently graduated from an alternative high school and plans on attending college in the fall. All the while, he continues to use marijuana concentrates. We are grateful for his progress, yet to this day, we count ourselves as one of the “lucky” families, knowing it could all literally change at any moment. My son is not alone. He is not the exception. Both he and we will have to deal with this for the rest of our lives.\”
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Marijuana is the number one drug found in completed teen suicides in Colorado.
- Completed suicides in Colorado have increased steadily from 2004 to 2018. Marijuana was present in 12.8% of all 14,229 suicides. For all ages, alcohol was the leading cause of drug found on death at 35.5%. However, for ages 10 — 19, marijuana was the leading drug found in 19.8% or 943 completed suicides, surpassing alcohol at 12.8%.
The Colorado Center for Health and Environmental Data, Department of Public Health and Environment.
- Adolescent suicides in Colorado had 16.1% positive marijuana toxicology. 269 adolescent suicide cases in Colorado were analyzed. Marijuana was found in 16.1% of adolescent suicide cases (age 10-19) compared with 6.9% of adults. Marijuana was found more than alcohol (12.7%) on toxicology results.
Jamison E, Bui AG, Herndon K, Bol K. Adolescent suicide in Colorado, 2008-2012. 2014 Nov;94:1-8.
Marijuana legalization is child abuse.
Legalization increases youth use. States with legal marijuana have the
highest use rates among 12-25 year olds. States without it have the lowest rates.
The brain is not fully developed until the mid to late 20\’s. Any marijuana use during brain development can have serious and lasting impacts.
Marijuana use can have dramatic negative impacts on children, teens and young adults
- Youth Marijuana Addiction Rate Double Rate of Alcohol & Other Substance Use Disorders
- Marijuana is the #1 drug for which teens and young adults seek addiction therapy.
- States that have \”legalized\” have higher teen and young adult use.
- The average age of marijuana introduction in some states is 12 years
- Teen cannabis use lowers IQ, despite claims to the contrary
- Use causes lung damage.
- Use can result in amotivational syndrome (failure to launch).
- Marijuana use increases educational drop out.
- Impacts to reproductive system.
Contaminates and poisons are commonplace in marijuana products.
Colorado’s largest marijuana corporations caught using the notorious Eagle-20 Fungicide on their marijuana plants. Eagle-20 is designed only for outdoor ornamental plants, i.e. outside flowers that you only look at, not plants consumed by humans, and definitely not for indoor enclosed environments. Eagle-20 contains myclobutanil, a chemical which, when heated, turns into hydrogen cyanide, a lethal gas. The effects of this awful gas are even more pronounced when it is concentrated and stuck into artificial plastic vape pens for heating, which are easier to carry and harder to detect, thus have become the preferred method of consumption for teens, along with glass “dab rigs” that resemble crack pipes.
AALM urges all parents and grandparents to talk to their kids and young adults daily about the dangers or marijuana and other drugs and seek help from informed parent groups such as Parent Movement 2.0.
“Marijuana Legalization is being aggressively pushed across the country by a motivated, well-funded and politically sophisticated industry – these efforts are taking away every family’s right to live in pot-free communities”
Media Contact
Southern California, Scott Chipman 619 990 7480 [email protected]
Northern California, Carla Lowe 916 708 4111 [email protected]
