This month, press releases from law enforcement and hospitals have poured into the newsroom, each one reporting a new overdose or arrest related to the use and distribution of synthetic marijuana.
Mississippi has been dealing with a sharp increase in overdoses from synthetic marijuana known as “spice,” a product offered as a safe, legal alternative to pot. Statewide, the number of spice overdoses have reached 87, including five new cases reported from the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson.
The new cases brings the total of patients treated at UMMC for spice overdoses to 45, according to an UMMC news release. About 40 cases have been reported outside of the Jackson area, including Meridian, Philadelphia, Monticello and Hazlehurst.
Two more spice users in Hancock County died this weekend from what investigators are calling a “bad batch.” Though exact cause of death hasn’t been determined, a Lowndes County man who died last weekend is believed to be a victim of that same bad batch.
But spice should not exist in the first place. Although sold as a safe, legal alternative to actual marijuana, it is exponentially more dangerous than pot. Unlike alcohol, heroin, cocaine, or spice, there are no recorded cases of marijuana overdoses.
Synthetic marijuana was developed for a simple reason: People like smoking pot and pot is illegal. Every year, millions of Americans take drug tests as part of a job application process. Employers are often forced into drug testing due to insurance policies. People want their jobs, so they stop smoking weed and start using spice.
But spice can be dangerous. The chemical make-up is constantly rearranged to make it legal. Science isn’t well applied and people get hurt. But it won’t show up in a drug screening.
Make no mistake, unless you are a professional athlete being examined for performance enhancing drugs, drug testing is only about marijuana.
More dangerous and addictive intoxicants such as alcohol, heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine don’t stay in the human body for long. The body treats these substances as poison. Within 48-hours of use, these drugs will be out of your system. Marijuana is different. The body doesn’t try to force it out. The human brain actually has cannabinoid receptors, specifically designed to receive naturally occurring chemicals in marijuana.
The body doesn’t see itself as under threat, and marijuana can linger in the human body for a month after consumption. Chances are, if someone is using heroin daily, they won’t get through the process of applying for a job and the series of interviews that lead to the point of drug testing.
A drug test won’t tell an employer if a perspective employee smoked marijuana right before he or she came to the office that day, or if it was used last weekend. Most people, no matter what their preferred vice is, will not go to work intoxicated. Employees who do suffer the consequences.
Although studies show marijuana is far less dangerous and possesses many more medical benefits than previously believed, it remains taboo. Minds in America, however, are changing rapidly. Four states and District of Columbia have legalized marijuana entirely. According to the Marijuana Policy Project, 57 percent of Americans live in a state with medical access to cannabis.
A Pew Research Center poll released this month showed 53 percent of Americans believe marijuana should be legalized, taxed and regulated for recreational use. Over 80 percent of Americans support medical cannabis.
No one is saying people without a medical need would be better off smoking marijuana. Any intoxicating, or for that matter, non-intoxicating substance can be abused.
As much as we can imagine how productive the human race would be if no intoxicating substances existed or were ever ingested, that is an implausible proposition. People are going to take substances that alter their state of mind. And the war on drugs has done little to stop it. The war on drugs has created drug testing. And drug testing has led to the production of alternative designer drugs such as spice, which is increasingly leading to death.
Maybe it’s time to reevaluate why we test for illegal drugs, and what the consequences are.
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