Recently, the NIDA Blog Team brought the science of marijuana to life in a series of posts about the drug’s effects on your brain, perception, pets, driving, and more. Here are a few highlights!
1. Marijuana use interferes with attention, motivation, memory, and learning. When used heavily during the teen years, it can lower grades and your IQ.
Wait...What?
2. Exposure to secondhand marijuana smoke rarely results in a contact high.
Phew.
3. Serving sizes for marijuana edibles are confusing—it’s easy to eat much more than a person means to, with bad side effects.
For real?
4. Marijuana doesn’t make you more creative—it just makes you think you are.
Dude, this is my masterpiece.
5. Marijuana can make dogs ill, causing serious medical issues such as injury, dehydration, anxiety, lethargy, impaired balance, vomiting, or diarrhea. A few dogs have even died from eating it.
No bueno.
6. Drugged driving is dangerous, illegal, and happening more and more. The risk of being in an accident doubles after marijuana use.
Do you know why I pulled you over?
7. Over three-quarters of the students surveyed in the "Monitoring the Future" study (and four-fifths of 8th graders) said they disapproved of people using marijuana regularly.
Do better.
8. Spice, also known as K2, is not fake marijuana. In fact, some effects of Spice are much more intense than those of marijuana and have even been linked to deaths.
Scary.
9. A small number of medications that contain THC are approved by the Food and Drug Administration. They are used for treating nausea and appetite problems caused by cancer chemotherapy and AIDS. Marijuana’s other chemical—cannabidiol or CBD—also is being studied for potential medical uses, including treatment for seizures.
Because…science.
10. Ancient healers used cannabis in religious ceremonies—not as a party drug.
That’s old school.
Comments
Hi psychstudent, assuming you meant "eating marijuana," the answer is no, it will not lessen the effects of the drug, but it will delay the effects—it could take as long as an hour to feel effects—and the effects last longer.
Many areas of the brain are affected by marijuana use, including the hippocampus (necessary for making new memories and for learning) and parts of the frontal cortex, which control how you make decisions.
There are many misconceptions about the patent you reference, which is not about medical marijuana or the whole plant itself. HHS holds a patent issued in 2003 for the use of cannabinoids (not cannabis) as antioxidants and neuroprotectants (http://1.usa.gov/dtbcVO). The patent describes the therapeutic potential for cannabinoid chemical compounds that are structurally similar to THC, but without its psychoactive properties, thereby treating specific conditions without the adverse side effects associated with smoked marijuana (such as cognitive deficits and addiction). The patent allows companies to license specific cannabinoids for research purposes. There is a significant amount of research underway to determine the both the potential medical benefits and possible risks of these compounds. You can learn more about these studies at https://www.drugabuse.gov/drugs-abuse/marijuana/nida-research-therapeuti....
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