Pubdate: Fri, 20 Sep 2002
Source: South Delta Leader (CN BC)
Copyright: 2002 South Delta Leader
Contact:  http://www.southdeltaleader.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1241
Author: Marc Ander

POT CONCERNS

Editor, The Leader:

Regarding the Senate report (Leader, Police Chief Pans Legal pot, Sept. 6) 
recommending marijuana legalization by comparing it to cigarettes and 
alcohol, our morgues are already full with 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 overall 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 legalizes 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 legalized before we 
knew its deadly effects. Do we really want to risk similar numbers for 
marijuana?

Marc Ander, Director, Airspace Action on Smoking & Health, Surrey
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart