True toll of skunk cannabis on mental health IOL_Lifestyle
Powerful ‘skunk’ cannabis flooding the streets of Britain increases the risk of psychosis five-fold, a major study reveals.
It is cultivated to have super-high levels of the psychoactive ingredient THC, making it up to ten times more powerful than the ‘weed’ and ‘hashish’ common 20 to 30 years ago. Voices for legalisation of cannabis have been growing in recent months, buoyed by the Government’s decision to permit limited use for medical treatment. The researchers warned against following the lead of Canada and the American states of Colorado and California, where legalisation has seen the potency increase.
‘The critical question is whether medicinal use remains medicinal. The problem in California and Canada was that medicinal use became a synonym for recreational use. Low-strength cannabis – with a THC level below 10 per cent – increased the odds of psychosis 2.2-fold if used daily and 1.4-fold if used more than once a week.
This was second only to Amsterdam, which would see a 50 per cent fall. In Cambridge, the only other British city to take part in the study, 8 per cent of psychosis cases were attributed to strong cannabis.
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