Girls smoke dope as much as boys - study

Teenage girls are now just as likely to smoke dope as boys, according to statistics showing rates are at an all-time low but a “hard core” of addicts still remains.

 

The National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre in Sydney released a report today confirming rates of cannabis use have continued to drop among Australians aged 14 to 39 over the past decade.

And while men in their 20s and 30s are still more likely to smoke the drug than their female counterparts, the gender difference has disappeared among teenagers.

“The idea that boys are more likely to smoke than girls is really a thing of the past now,” said centre director Professor Jan Copeland.

Statistics show between 1995 and 2007 rates of teenage smoking dropped from 36 to 13 per cent for boys and from 20 to 13 per cent for girls.

“That’s a spectacular drop for boys and a considerably smaller one for girls, because they were less risky in the first place, so now they’re in the same place,” Prof Copeland said.

Studies show a similar pattern for tobacco and alcohol use.

She said those deterred from cannabis over the decade were the low level experimenters who were always at less risk of harm and who took in the cannabis messages pitched in state and national campaigns.

“What we are left with now is the hard core of both boys and girls, if you like, the committed cannabis users who have other problems in their lives,” Prof Copeland said.

“It’s going to take more than an ad campaign on television to deter them.”

The biggest group of committed smokers has historically been 20-somethings, but the report showed they were now in their 30s.

Prof Copeland said this was an ageing cohort of people who started smoking in the 1970s and 1980s and had failed to give up.

“Whilst we’ve been quite good in our public health attempts to deter people from smoking, we need to be thinking more about how to help those who are already entrenched and have remained there.”

The report also examined cannabis-related presentations at two Sydney emergency departments and showed more than three quarters were male.

More than a third were violent and had mental health problems, including suicidal thoughts and major anxiety.

Cannabis plants seized by police

More than 4,000 cannabis plants have been seized from a disused industrial unit in Inverclyde.

The haul, which is believed to be worth £1.2m, was recovered from the site in Muirsheil Road, Port Glasgow, three weeks ago following a tip off.

Police said it was the second largest recovery of cannabis plants ever to be made in Scotland.

Other material seized, which includes horticultural equipment and lights and fans, will be donated to charity.

Cannabis education key to harm reduction

An Internet cannabis community has challenged the British government to come up with a cannabis policy which is based around reducing harm, as opposed to using law enforcement as the primary strategy in the war against cannabis. And according to a spokesman for the Canna Zine cannabis news website , the governments reticence to take into account the fact close to 4 million people choose cannabis over other soft drugs such as tobacco and alcohol, is motivated not by any public health concern, but by money.

To illustrate this fact lets use tobacco as a comparison? Original cheese - available from the Canna Zine seed shop Tobacco kills tens of thousands of people every year around the world. If it were invented today tobacco would carry with it the harshest drug scheduling, as its more addictive statistically than heroin or cocaine. Yet cannabis, a substance which is yet to be accounted for a single credible cause of death, is the substance which is outlawed?

In alcohol we have a substance which is sold on every street corner, by convenience stores and petrol stations up and down the country. In the wrong hands a single bottle of vodka is as dangerous as a loaded gun. It can kill if abused. Yet scientific data proves cannabis would need to be consumed at an impossible rate - thousands of joints an hour, to get anywhere near a truly “lethal” reaction?

The Vapor Snake - harm reduction in a box

All the while teenagers are able to easily source alcohol on the streets as a plethora of news reports have shown recently. Alcohol has spawned another unhappy by-product of its existence, with the new breed of TV documentaries which trail the special police squads tasked with tackling inner-city street crime. The majority of which is fuelled by alcohol. Its now nothing unusual to see a police car “lured” to a secluded area, only to be set upon by hood-wearing, petrol-bomb brandishing thugs drinking cheap strong cider, the whole event cleverly orchestrated to facilitate the all-important video footage which is uploaded to YouTube or BeBo within minutes of it happening. Educate “The government have been caught up in the look-tough-on-drugs race with the Conservatives as each party jostles for position as the party likely to come down hardest against illicit drugs”. Meanwhile around Europe our neighbours and close trading allies are moving the other way, as they make allowances for a small percentage of their citizens who consume cannabis. Spain and Portugal have essentially decriminalised possession of amounts of cannabis deemed “personal”, and Belgium is in the middle of sorting out its position as Belgian group “Trekt Uw Plant” challenges the Belgian government over their right to grow a single cannabis plant per-citizen. Whilst a Belgian citizen may grow a single plant for his or her own consumption, Trekt Uw Plant believe an association of growers should be able to plant collectively, in a field, allowing disabled citizens to take part alongside able-bodied. In the meantime, the United Kingdom is threatening to imprison its citizens for upto 5 years for simple possession? It makes no sense. In a bid to reduce harm, the Canna Zine cannabis forums are giving away a Vapor Snake vaporizer which is proved to reduce harmful emissions from cannabis by upto 95%. Amsterdam coffe-shops have adopted the vaporizer wholesale, as the Dutch national smoking ban came into force on July 1st 2008. Since that date you may only consume cannabis in a public building as long as it (the joint, not the building) contains no tobacco. Proof if it were ever needed, the British drug laws need over-hauling, and it needs to be done soon. To reduce your own exposure to the possible harms associated with cannabis use, simply sign up to the cannabis forums and participate.

Cannabis Campaign: A toke without smoke

The British Medical Association’s long-awaited endorsement of cannabis as a potential source for beneficial medicines came with a strong public health warning, writes Graham Ball. In a rider to their influential report The Therapeutic Uses of Cannabis, published last Tuesday, medical experts pointed out that smoking a cannabis joint can lead to three times more tar inhalation than smoking a cigarette.

However you do not have to smoke to toke (enjoy the effects of cannabis and marijuana). A hi-tech device bypasses the health hazards associated with the traditional methods of administering cannabis. This product is as common in stonner’s homes as a microwave or oven. Herbal Vaporizers virtually eliminate the health risk of smoking a joint. They are often referred to as weed vaporizers, pot vaporizers, cannabis vaporizers and marijuana vaporizers.

The Mini Vaporizer is one example of a Herb Vaporizer. It offers a portable system that heats the preferred herbal mixture to the point where, in the case of cannabis, the THC (the active mood-altering substance) is released.The vapor is then passed through a water filter and inhaled. There is no smoke and therefore no tar. According to those who have sampled the system its effects are identical to smoking. This vaporizer is cheaper then the more high end models, like the Volcano Vaporizer, Super Vapezilla, HerbalAire and others.

You can purchase all of these vaporizers from HerbalVapor.com