Drug Watch International

DRUG WATCH WORLD NEWS

AUSTRALIA: AN UPDATE
By:  Jill Pearman, Prevention Resource Centres International, Sydney, Australia

In July 1998, Drug Watch Australia, with the support of PRYDE, Life Education International, and the Australian Doctors Fund, held an International Drug Prevention Symposium in Sydney.  Torgny Petersen from Sweden, Dr. Ernst Aeschbach from Switzerland, and Dr. Alvera Stern from the United States were among the speakers.  The symposium attracted delegates from all over Australia.  The theme was "Inspire a Child for Life," and the objective was to highlight the working concept of prevention and to expand its advocacy base.  The two-day symposium was a great success and assisted those working in the field to broaden their understanding of Prevention theory and practice.

With the launch of the Prime Minister's "Tough on Drugs" package, Australia's drug strategy places greater emphasis on prevention.  With this change has come welcome interest and action from a strong base of Australian parents and communities.  This grass-roots action is in response to the high level of drug use within Australia.  Parents have simply had enough of their children damaging their brains and their future potential through the use of drugs.

There is little doubt that the drug situation worldwide is the result of misinformation that softens the general attitude toward drugs.  Daily, the Australian press churns out biased pro-drug opinion. This constant flow of largely unchallenged propaganda regarding the merits of decriminalization of drugs is dangerous.  People are confused, and the hard fact that drugs are harmful to the mind and body, and particularly to our children, is softened.

It is time for communities to stand up and take positive action to stop the damage of drugs to the minds and bodies of our precious children.  The combination of community and parent action, good public education on the health risks of drugs, and good school-based drug prevention education is the key to reducing the level of drug use among our young people.  The growth of parent and community groups in Australia is an encouraging and necessary trend.

One thing is clear: Drugs adversely affect the developing brain.  Our children deserve a clear and unequivocal message from a myriad of sources that drugs cause harm and damage, and they should be avoided.

THE CANNABIS HEMP PROBLEM

"The way to legalize marijuana is to sell marijuana legally.  When you can buy it at your neighborhood shopping mall, IT'S LEGAL!"
(Hemp activists Matthew Cheng and Alex Shum, High Times, 3/90)

Pro-legalizers are to some extent succeeding with their marijuana hemp strategy.  This strategy is to alter what they say about cannabis hemp according to the audience.  To encourage fellow supporters of marijuana legalization, they market hemp as an accessory to drug use and an avenue toward legalization.  To the rest of the world, they present cannabis sativa hemp as a "necessary" resource and falsely claim that it is entirely different from cannabis sativa dope.

Hemp advocates claim that by trying to grow cannabis with low levels of psychoactive THC, growers would not have any involvement with illegal drug use.  What they fail to mention is that:

1. THC content varies from plant to plant.  Whether plants with different THC levels occurred through natural variation or were planted by marijuana enthusiasts to vary intentionally, THC strength would be impossible to control without plant-by-plant testing. 
2. Even low THC marijuana is in demand as a street drug, and it can give a high to first-time users (typically teenagers or pre-teens).
3. Hemp products are widely touted as a symbol of support for drug use, as well as broader legalization efforts.

A glaring example of the intermingling of hemp and drug use advocacy was the Hempilation record album produced by Capricorn Records to benefit the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, a long-standing pro-legalization group.  Among the songs are: I Wanna Get High, I Like Marijuana, Sweet Leaf, Champagne and Reefer, and Legalize It.  The lyrics of I Like Marijuana lyrics say . . . I want to get stoned. I want to be a runaway; got to leave home for marijuana.  I smoke pot.  I like it a lot.

Hemp advocates have tried to enhance the image of hemp by ascribing heroic characteristics to it, ranging from saving forests to being environmentally superior for farm fields.  Drug Watch has gathered experts’ statements debunking all of these claims.  Contact the Drug Watch office for a Position Statement on hemp.  (Drug Watch International, P.O. Box 45218, Omaha, NE  68145-0218;  telephone: (402) 384-9212,  fax:  (402) 397-9924, or visit the Drug Watch Home Page at www.DrugWatch.org.

Most major farms and industrial organizations do not support greater hemp development because they recognize that:

1. Large-scale growing of cannabis sativa, even if ostensibly grown with lower levels of intoxicating THC, makes enforcement of marijuana laws much more difficult. 
2. The potential market for hemp products is limited, so large investments in hemp production may never turn a profit. 

As summarized by the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) in July 1997, “According to the USDA and the U.S. Department of Commerce, the profitability of industrial hemp is highly uncertain and probably unlikely.  Hemp is a novelty product with limited sustainable development value even in a novelty market. … For every proposed use of industrial hemp, there already exists an available product, or raw material, that is cheaper to manufacture and provides better market results.”

However, some smaller scale farmers and retailers are accepting hemp as a way to make money.  Some are ignorant about hemp being a leading edge for marijuana legalization, and others accept legalizers’ assurances that cannabis sativa hemp and cannabis sativa marijuana are not the same.  Pro-legalizers are well served by such allies.  The support of trusting farmers makes it more difficult to differentiate unknowing hemp supporters from pro-legalizers who are merely claiming to be “pure” in their support of hemp.

Meanwhile, pro-legalization groups meanwhile continue to promote hemp as a symbol for their cause.   Particularly in the United States, these groups are succeeding in maintaining the symbolism, yet they also encourage mainstream retail outlets to unknowingly sell this symbol as a mere consumer good.  In many instances, pro-legalization efforts are funded by hemp sales.  The result is that although a vast majority of U.S. citizens reject legalization, many are unknowingly “voting” for it symbolically and financially by their purchase of hemp products.

Drug Watch International is studying this problem and plans to take action early in 1999 to address it.  Meanwhile, Drug Watch encourages you to become informed about the hemp problem and alert to hemp products in stores and markets.  Don’t let people get away with saying that cannabis sativa hemp isn’t cannabis sativa marijuana.  Don’t let people get away with saying marijuana is a “soft” drug that doesn’t hurt anyone.  The pro-legalization movement is using hemp to promote acceptance of marijuana, and unless someone stands against this, the movement will succeed.

THE FACES OF CHILDREN
By Daniel Brookoff, M.D., Ph.D.

"Send a policeman fast!  Daddy's got a big knife, and he's gonna cut Mommy's head off."  Approximately 10 percent of the 911 calls for domestic violence in Memphis, Tennessee, are made by children, some as young as six years old. 

I participated with a group of primary care physicians in a project sponsored by Methodist Hospital and the Memphis (Tennessee) Police Department.  We accompanied police officers on emergency calls for domestic violence and privately interviewed everyone at the scene of the crime.  In two thirds of the cases, assailants were interviewed, sometimes in the back seat of a police car.  Many had prior arrests relating to violent behavior and drug abuse, but few had received treatment.

An epidemic of dual addiction to cocaine and alcohol is sweeping the country, and it is going largely unnoticed.  In our study of 70 families who called the police for emergency help relating to battering, two thirds of the assailants used cocaine and alcohol at the same time.  When used in combination, a third active drug is formed, cocacthylene, which is more intoxicating, longer lasting, and more potent in its ability to kindle violent behavior than either alcohol or cocaine alone.

Drug abuse plays a major role in family violence.  Law enforcement officials know that domestic assault is one of the most dangerous crimes and that assaults carried out under the influence of drugs and alcohol are much more likely to result in severe injury and death.  However, there are few interventions aimed at drug abuse among batterers. 

Past dogma stated that a drug abuser had to have the insight to seek treatment on his or her own, for any chance of success.  Recent studies prove this wrong and show that those who are forced into treatment have success rates comparable to those who enter the same programs voluntarily.  In Memphis, police now investigate drug use by domestic assailants and bring it to the attention of prosecutors and judges, resulting in stiffer sentences and higher rates of compelled treatment. 

Our study also showed the victims of drug abuse that go uncounted: the children.  In over half of the cases, children were exposed to the beating of their mothers and were often direct victims of the violence themselves.  Seeing the children turned out to be the hardest part of the project for me.  We found them cowering under beds or in corners, sometimes emulating violent behavior. 

A group of physicians and police officers asked legislators to make beating a woman in front of her children a felony, mandating criminal investigations and possible prison time, such as in Florida.  A state Senate committee rejected it as being "too expensive."  One senator suggested that it would put a third of the male population of Tennessee in state prison!

In a joint report prepared by police officers and physicians, we asked legislators to:
  Test assailants for drugs and alcohol
  Detoxify arrested assailants prior to release from jail
  Make assault under the influence of drugs a felony
  Mandate treatment and periodic drug monitoring of people convicted of assault under the influence of drugs.

Some people think that drug-related violence arises from commerce in drugs, and therefore, calls for legalization.  I am convinced that most drug-related violence is due to the consumption of drugs.  Thousands of battered women and despairing children must be counted among the victims.

An article describing this project appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1998 (volume 227, pages 1369-1373).  A videotape, "Drug Use and Domestic Violence," produced by the U.S. Department of Justice is available from the National Criminal Justice Reference Service, 1-800-851-3420 or 1-301-251-5500, tape NCJ 163056.  Watch the faces of the children.

Daniel Brookoff, M.D., Ph.D., is an oncologist, assistant professor of medicine, and researcher at Methodist Hospital Department of Medical Education, Memphis, Tennessee.  His research papers on drug testing, medical complications of drug abuse, drug treatment, emergency room treatment of cocaine users, marijuana and driving, and the effects of drugs on domestic abuse are widely published.  Dr. Brookoff is the vice chair of the Drug Watch International Drug Strategy Institute.

VANCOUVER, OR IS IT AMSTERDAM?
By:  David Mann, a police officer for over 23 years with the Victoria, British Columbia, Police Department.  He is a Drug Watch International Delegate from Canada.

These days many drug-legalization proponents have renamed Vancouver, British Columbia, "Vansterdam," because of the similarity between the liberal drug policies of Vancouver and Amsterdam. 

Vancouver has become familiar to many because of national media coverage of its East Side AIDS epidemic.  The city supports the largest needle exchange program in the world, and the disease, crime, and squalor that have become associated with needle giveaways abound.  The problem continues to grow because many hard line "harm reductionists" work within the Province Government, and they want to expand the failed needle giveaway program and institute other decriminalization measures similar to those of the Netherlands and Switzerland.

Vancouver's marijuana problems are equally severe.  Organizations such as Cannabis Cafe and Hemp BC, which are centered in the city, stir up support for marijuana decrminalization and legalization.  Marc Emery, the past owner of these two businesses, continues to dominate the press with his cries of injustice and inhumane treatment of marijuana users.

British Columbia currently grows marijuana reaching a level of 52 percent THC.  An estimated two/thirds of all the marijuana grown in British Columbia makes its way into the United States.  Its potency, usually 12 to 20 percent THC, makes it a welcomed trading item commonly referred to as a "BC Bud." 

Why is this happening in British Columbia?  The lax attitude of the Justice System in British Columbia has generated the problem and has allowed British Columbia growers to cultivate some of the most potent indoor hydroponic marijuana in the world.  Although many officers still regard marijuana possession as an offense and take action, the pro-pot media blitz and courts that fail to see the problems have caused some law enforcement officers to refer to present policy as F.I.D.O. or F#*! it.  Drive On.  This complacency has created a situation in which drug offenses such as growing, possession, and dealing of marijuana are often tolerated or ignored. 

Vancouver is a study for the rest of the world on the failed policies of a permissive justice system.  We sustain out-of-control social and medical problems in combination with a high crime rate.

Look to the future and avoid our mistakes.

DRUG WATCH EYE-OPENERS

It's popular today to promote smoking marijuana for medicinal reasons.  Otherwise sane pundits and columnists extol the virtues of marijuana as medicine.  Some propose the drug's outright legalization.  Many people who have seen the damage the drug does are confused by pro-marijuana rhetoric, but they needn't be.  The spin, coming largely from the drug culture, is easily refuted by the following facts: 

Marijuana as Medicine — Marijuana is a weed containing over 400 different chemicals.  The U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows physicians to prescribe synthetically produced THC (one of the chemicals in marijuana) in a pill form called "Marinol" for chemotherapy-induced nausea.  But few physicians prescribe this because new anti-nausea drugs work better and don't cause the devastating side effects of Marinol, such as "profound effects on the mental status,"  "psychotic experience," and the unmasking of "symptoms of schizophrenia. ⁽¹⁾

Strength — In 1974, potency in marijuana averaged .85 percent THC (THC produces pot's "high").  In 1996, the average THC level reached 5.01 percent, with some samples exceeding 29 percent.  Worldwide competition to grow super-pot has produced a popular strain called "sinsemilla," which averages 10.48% THC.  Today's strong varieties commonly cause disorientation, memory loss, hallucinations, panic anxiety, and sometimes psychosis.  ⁽²⁾ 

Addiction — For years, pot proponents have claimed that the drug is not addictive; however, various research studies have long labeled marijuana as addictive.  In 1997, Science Magazine reported "disturbing similarities between marijuana's effects on the brain and those produced by cocaine, heroin, alcohol, and nicotine."  One researcher concluded that "people should no longer consider THC a "soft drug" and should approach marijuana with far more caution than before." ⁽³⁾

Carcinogens — Dr. Donald Tashkin of UCLA has found that, just as in cigarette smokers, cilia cells in the lungs of pot smokers die and are replaced by mucous-producing and abnormally proliferating cells, a known pre-cancerous condition.  Marijuana smoke contains more of the carcinogen benzopyrene than does tobacco smoke.  Why try to ban cigarette use while advocating marijuana use? ⁽⁴⁾

Human Reproduction — Doctors meeting at the NYU School of Medicine agreed that marijuana disrupts testes and uterine function at the molecular level.  Periods have ceased in females using pot regularly.  In males, sperm counts decrease and abnormal sperm form.  Research in progress is testing for congenital damage. ⁽⁵⁾

No One Dies — Because most people don't overdose on marijuana, the drug culture embraces this canard, but overdose is only one way that drugs kill.  Files at the National Transportation Safety Board are replete with fatalities caused by car and truck drivers high on marijuana.  Traumatizing household and workplace accidents, domestic violence, juvenile crimes and homicide have all been laid at marijuana's doorstep.  Marijuana is the primary substance mentioned in autopsies of children and adolescents. ⁽⁶⁾

Learn these facts and share them with communities, families, and the young people in your life.  Be firm in your stance against using marijuana.  Research and common sense agree that clear policies against drug use help young people say "no."

Footnotes:

1.        Roxane Laboratories warning label for Marinol (Drabinol) 2.5, 5.0, or 10.0 mg.

2.        E. Voth and R. Schwartz, Annals of Internal Medicine, Vol. 126, #10, pp. 791-798, May 15, 1997.  Marijuana Potency Monitoring Project

3.        "Pharmacology of Marihuana," Raven Press, 1976, p. 627. "Marihuana: Biological Effects," Dr. W.D.M. Paton, 1978.  "Science Magazine," Vol. 276, June 27, 1997.

4.        Palm Beach Post, Thursday, December 26, 1996. p. 14A.  "Marijuana Research Review," Vol. 3, No. 3, October 1996.

5.        "Marihuana and Medicine:  A Summary" -- An International Conference held at New York University School of Medicine, March 20-21, 1998.

6.        U.S. Drug Abuse Warning Network Annual "Medical Examiner Data" 1996.  U.S. SAMHSA Office of Applied Studies, 1998, Federal DHHS publication 98-3228.

INTERNATIONAL NEWS BRIEFS
(January, 1999)

  In the United States, substance abuse and addiction is the No. 1 public health problem and must be addressed on all fronts, including prevention, treatment, law enforcement, and research.  (American Journal of Public Health, Vol. 88, No. 1, 1998)

  The U.S. Drug Czar called the Dutch drug policy of letting its citizens use marijuana for therapeutic and recreational purposes "an unmitigated disaster." (Springfield, IL, Journal  7-11- 98)

  In a joint resolution passed on September, 15 1998, the U.S. Congress reaffirmed its support of the current FDA system for classifying substances for medicinal use and opposed any bypassing of that system.  Specifically addressed were schedule 1 drugs, including marijuana, all of which fail to meet FDA medicinal safety and efficacy standards.  (International Drug Strategy Institute, #98-0918-52)

  By an overwhelming majority, the Canadian Chiefs of Police passed a new resolution at their recent conference.  They will fight any attempt at decriminalization or legalization of currently illicit drugs.  A similar resolution had been passed by the British Columbia Chiefs of Police Association. (DM, Canada, 9-19-98)

  According to Dr. Mostefa Khiati, President of  FOREM, an Algerian Support Research and Healthcare organization, 50 percent of the drug abusers in Algeria are under the age of 20.  (RW, Switzerland, 9-18-98)

  A recent survey of 1,501 adults within the continental United States found that the No. 1 issue troubling children is drug abuse.  (Harvard, U. of Maryland, and Robert Wood Johnson Foundation survey, 1998, DREAM 9-98)

  Smoking nearly doubles the risk of hearing loss says a University of Wisconsin study, and researchers at Erasmus University in the Netherlands found that smokers are twice as likely than lifetime nonsmokers to develop Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia.  (DREAM, 9-98)

  Dozens of Swiss marijuana retail stores have been selling dried hemp, packed in small cloth bags, as potpourri. These stores could be facing imminent closure as prosecutors in Zurich take one shop owner to court in a test case.  (Reuters 10-12-98, SB 10-16-98)

  Marijuana was decriminalized in Alaska in 1975 and was recriminalized in 1990.  During those 15 years of quasi-legal use of marijuana by adults, Alaskan youth used at twice the rate of the national use by other teens.  (LA, Alaska, 9-03-98)

  On May 11, 1998, there was an addition to the U.S. national paraphernalia law that makes it illegal to use the Internet to ship drug paraphernalia.  (Report from NE Congressional Aid, 7-18- 98)

  A new U.S. study by researchers at Brown University estimates that subtle deficits in IQ and language development will occur in up to 80,550 cocaine-exposed children. The special education to prevent these children from failing in school will cost up to $352 million per year nationwide.  (US NIDA release10-22-98, Science Magazine, 10-23-98)

  "By any measure, the level of recent drug use among 1997 Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Program arrestees is significant.  Every U.S. site reported that a majority of its male adult arrestees tested positive for at least one drug.  The same is true for female adult arrestees in 19 out of 21 sites where data were collected."  (US 1997 ADAM Annual Report, Conclusion)

  In New York in June 1998, U.N. Member States approved a Political Declaration aimed at eliminating or significantly reducing the illicit cultivation of the coca bush, the cannabis plant, and the opium poppy by 2008.   The Political Declaration is one of the most important documents on drugs ever approved by U.N. Member States.  (HNN PR 981021)

  In the mid-1970s, the Oregon Comprehensive Cancer Project, funded by NIDA, initiated a study of marijuana use in cancer patients to determine any benefits in both nausea and weight gain.  The study was terminated before one year was completed.  The anti-nausea effects were marginal at best and did not compare with any of the standard anti-nausea drugs of that decade.  Appetite stimulation necessitated frequent use of marijuana, and the side effects were unacceptable.  "We (cancer specialists) have found essentially no use for marijuana in the field of cancer therapy."  (Richard A. Ellerby, M.D., Medical Oncologist, 10-27-98)

  Scientists at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that smoking marijuana and crack can cause the same pre-cancerous changes in bronchial cells as tobacco smoking causes, well before the smoker gets cancer.  (WR, AP-NY-8-18-98)

  Police in New Zealand told Parliament that one in seven killers were under the influence of cannabis at the time of their crime, and one in five were regular cannabis users.  About one in four victims were reported to have been regular cannabis users.  (HNN 8-6-98)

FROM THE DESK OF SANDRA BENNETT
President, Drug Watch International

Billions of dollars are spent annually on media campaigns designed to sell ideas, products, and personalities to the public.  Whether creating a frenzied desire to buy trivial items such as Beanie Babies and Cabbage Patch dolls, or promoting the notion of drug legalization, the common denominator includes sophisticated marketing strategies and media hype.

The "worthiness" of the objective of a marketing campaign is as irrelevant to a media consultant as the guilt or innocence of a client is to a criminal defense lawyer.  Coaching his drug-using cohorts on how they could get the American public to accept legalization,

Washington D.C., lawyer Eric Sterling told them, "Packaging is everything, and messages get packaged."  All they needed to do, he said, was change their image, quit getting stoned, raise some money, and disguise their effort as something the public would feel good about.  Sympathetic billionaire and derivatives/hedge fund trader, George Soros, provided the money, and legalization was packaged as "compassion." 

In recent years, the media has taken less and less responsibility for being factual and unbiased.  People have been relentlessly pounded with articles regaling the purported medical value of smoking marijuana cigarettes, while scientific information refuting the safety or efficacy of this mind-altering and addictive drug has been repeatedly suppressed.  When the media hides facts from the public and becomes a propaganda arm for the whole drug legalization movement, it makes what the tobacco companies did look like a little white lie.

The sympathetic stance taken by the media (print, movies, television, and music) to casual and "medicinal" use of marijuana must be seen as a primary factor in the rise of drug use. This is supported by studies showing that when perceived risks and disapproval are diminished, drug use escalates.

With the addition of the Internet, the problem has worsened.  This media vehicle has no checks or balances, no standards, no ratings, and it has proven to be fertile ground for ideas such as drug legalization, anarchy, child pornography, and other social ills that once had very limited audiences. Hundreds of Internet sites now promote drug use and sell drugs and drug paraphernalia.  Teachers send school children to the Internet to do research, usually unsupervised, and the Internet is where children find out how to grow, manufacture, buy, sell, and use illicit drugs.  Is it any wonder that perception of danger is down and drug use is escalating?

Freedom of the press is a responsibility as well as a right, and the media must be held accountable. Perhaps, when the media regains its integrity, our children will learn the importance of critical thinking, and drug use will again be shunned.

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