Pubdate: Mon, 09 Sep 2002
Source: Peak, The (CN BC)
Copyright: 2002 Peak Publications Society
Contact:  http://www.peak.sfu.ca/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/775
Author: Marc Ander
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mjcn.htm (Cannabis - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

MARIJUANA IS BAD FOR YOU

Regarding the Sept. 4 Senate report recommending marijuana legalisation by 
comparing it to cigarettes and alcohol, our morgues are already full of 
victims of tobacco and alcohol. Why do we need a third legal drug added to 
the mix?

Marijuana smokers scream until they're blue in the face that it's never 
killed anybody, while writing off as coincidence that regular marijuana 
smokers get lung cancer almost as often as their nicotine-addicted 
counterparts. Or that marijuana shows up in the blood of those who cause 
fatal traffic accidents almost as often as alcohol.

The over-all death rate is relatively low precisely because marijuana usage 
is relatively low, but that will change fast if we put marijuana into 
corner stores as the senators recommend. The world's biggest tobacco 
companies have already trademarked brand names like "Acapulco Gold" so if 
any country ever legalises marijuana, they can move fast to get packs of 20 
"Acapulco Golds" into the supermarkets next to the bananas, or to lace 
existing tobacco brands with subliminal levels of marijuana.

Tobacco will kill roughly half of Canada's five-million-odd cigarette 
smokers alive today. Big Tobacco kills more Canadians every year than the 
42,000 that died in all six years of World War II combined, and recruits 
thousands more Canadian kids every week. Tobacco was legalised before we 
knew its deadly effects. Do we really want to risk similar numbers for 
marijuana?

Marc Ander
- ---
MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager