In 2016, Ben Cort delivered a powerful presentation at the fourth annual David E. Smith Symposium, the theme of which was marijuana. Ben raised important, frequently overlooked concerns about the risks of making marijuana and cannabis products more available to the public.
In the election that fall, more states legalized marijuana for both medicinal and recreational purposes. With momentum increasing for decriminalization and legalization, commercialization and industrialization of cannabis are not far behind. Weed, Inc. examines the many implications of that phenomenon.
Ben informs us, “What the generations before us smoked isn’t what kids today are using. The 2 percent THC weed of the Woodstock era is gone; it has been replaced by something with a potency unimaginable a few years ago and consumable in forms that we never thought possible.” Those consumable forms include concentrated extracts packaged as candy.
Limited research data suggests that these stronger products may cause more adverse reactions to cannabis use in the short term. As Ben notes, “For the first time ever, cannabis withdrawal was included in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5).” No one knows what the long-term effects might be.
When I founded the Haight Ashbury Free Medical Clinic during the Summer of Love in 1967, I witnessed the tragic consequences of the popular idea that drugs were harmless. Voices like Ben’s can help us avoid repeating that history.
—David E. Smith, MD