cannabisnews.com: Speaker: Pot Potency Higher Speaker: Pot Potency Higher Posted by CN Staff on January 25, 2005 at 07:57:08 PT By Jennifer Rigg of the Journal Star Source: Journal Star Peoria -- The casual marijuana-smoking days the baby boomers once enjoyed are long gone, a national drug expert will explain to a Peoria audience today. Dr. Andrea Barthwell, a former deputy director for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, said today's young people are suffering the consequences of smoking a much more addictive and dangerous type of marijuana. Barthwell hopes to inform parents and community members of these dangers at a discussion at 9:30 a.m. today at White Oaks Center, 3400 New Leaf Lane. In the 1970s and 80s, the active ingredient in marijuana, THC, was at 3.5 percent, Barthwell said. Today, the THC found in most marijuana averages more than 7 percent. But specific growing techniques can skyrocket the amount of THC to as high as 27 percent."The higher (the THC) gets, the more rapidly you deliver a large jolt of the active ingredient to the brain," she said. "Today's marijuana is much more powerful and much more addictive than it was a generation ago."As marijuana users develop a more regular pattern of use, they can become increasingly dependent on the drug and actually go through withdrawals if they attempt to quit, Barthwell said. Chronic users can also experience changes in their brain activity that interfere with their ability to form memories."Memories that you should be making while you're smoking aren't made," Barthwell said. "So marijuana intoxication selectively renders you incapable of functioning on the basis of knowledge regarding your personal life."While she stresses that the risks and dangers of marijuana abuse are critical, prevention is possible, and the key to it lies in the education of parents."When (baby boomers) look at their children's use of marijuana, they look at it through a lens of their own experience," Barthwell said. "And that lens creates an ability to think that marijuana use maybe isn't that harmful, but if you compound the fact that children are using at a younger age when the brain is developing and they're using a higher potency product, you can understand why we feel a need to inform parents about the real risk."Barthwell's discussion also will focus on the push for legalized marijuana for medical uses, or the "decriminalization movement." This movement is led by groups like the National Association for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) and the Marijuana Policy Project, whose campaign is targeting Illinois."They're using the medical marijuana issue as a wedge to create public support to make marijuana legal for non-medical use," Barthwell said. "They use the pain and suffering of patients and the natural compassion that we as Americans feel to change the drug laws in this country."Legalizing (marijuana) as a drug will set the clock of modern medicine back to a time when, as a young country, Americans were exposed to a host of often benign and sometimes deadly medicine 'cure-alls' sold from the back of a horse-drawn cart."Note: Elevated THC levels make marijuana more dangerous than before.Source: Peoria Journal Star (IL) Author: Jennifer Rigg of the Journal StarPublished: Tuesday, January 25, 2005Copyright: 2005 Peoria Journal Star Website: http://pjstar.com/ Contact: comment pjstar.com Related Articles & Web Sites:NORMLhttp://www.norml.org/Marijuana Policy Projecthttp://www.mpp.org/ Sanity In Chicago - AlterNethttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread19568.shtmlChicago Wants Laissez-Faire Approach To MJhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread19554.shtml Home Comment Email Register Recent Comments Help Comment #18 posted by JR Bob Dobbs on January 26, 2005 at 13:21:21 PT And... "Chronic users can also experience changes in their brain activity that interfere with their ability to form memories."Unlike alcohol drinkers, who remember everything with crystal clarity the next day... [ Post Comment ] Comment #17 posted by JR Bob Dobbs on January 26, 2005 at 13:20:17 PT LTE Sirs, If marijuana has become more potent over the past generation, why is there still the same number of deaths attributable to marijuana this year as there was last year, the year before that, and every year previous? That number: ZERO. No human being in all of recorded history has ever overdosed on marijuana. Not on the weakest pot or the strongest. Never, once, ever. I defy Andrea Barthwell to prove otherwise. Meanwhile, young adults are binge drinking and dying from alcohol poisoning on a regular basis. [ Post Comment ] Comment #16 posted by darwin on January 26, 2005 at 06:59:43 PT Dupont and Barthwell There are tons of connections to Dupont, specifically Robert Dupont and Dupont Pharma. Just do a search on Andrea Barthwell and Dupont. Here are just a few.http://www.asam.org/news/news19.htm "Andrea G. Barthwell, M.D., FASAM, has been voted ASAM's President-Elect in just-completed balloting." & in the same aricle... "State-funded AIDS Drug Assistance Programs in California and New York have added efavirenz (SustivaŽ, DuPont), a once-daily anti-HIV treatment, to their ADAP formularies."Also http://www.aidschicago.org/advocacy/barthwell.php "We the undersigned Illinois HIV/AIDS service providers are writing to express support for Dr. Andrea G. Barthwell's appointment as Deputy Director for Demand Reduction of the Office of National Drug Control Policy." & "We offer our unconditional support for her appointment. Sincerely, DuPont Pharmaceuticals Co. 3624 N. Lakewood, 2nd floor, Chicago, Illinois 60613; 773-832-4433; Contact: Larry R. Wolf, Senior HIV Community Manager"Also http://www.asam.org/news/news8.htm Regional Director Alan Wartenberg, M.D., F.A.S.A.M., , reports that Region III held a very successful regional meeting"...."The meeting was staffed by Pat Besinger and Hilding Ohstrom and supported by educational grants from Roxane Pharmaceuticals and DuPont Pharma." This paragraph discusses drug treatment and use...Also http://parentsendingprohibition.homestead.com/2003.html "Marijuana is a drug and not a medicine. We have made time-honored process in this country when we bring medications to the market-place that protects the health of the patient and marijuana has not gone through that test," Barthwell said." and in the same article.... "Dr. Robert L. DuPont, the former director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, also condemned Ehrlich's decision. "I think he will come to regret this decision," said (Robert) DuPont, who served as drug czar under Presidents Nixon and Ford. "Medical marijuana is a hoax. It's a Trojan horse for the legalization movement."" [ Post Comment ] Comment #15 posted by darwin on January 26, 2005 at 06:44:58 PT Barthwell She has had ties to the power structure behind Dupont since before she was on the government dime. I think her government post was a just something to add to her resume so she could make even more money representing companies like dupont, who have a vested interest in prohibition. [ Post Comment ] Comment #14 posted by ekim on January 25, 2005 at 18:14:00 PT Dr. Andrea Barthwell--------- debate a real expert http://www.freedomtoexhale.com/can.htmSo they hired Harvard's Grinspoon as their scientific adviser.Grinspoon has been proselytizing about the benefits of marijuana for more than 25 years. He put forward the first business proposals to develop whole-plant products and has been a tireless crusader for medical pot.After a lifetime of studying marijuana, here are Grinspoon's conclusions, which are prominently featured in Cannasat's promotional literature:"There is very little to support the proposition that smoking marijuana represents a great risk to the pulmonary system. Although cannabis has been smoked widely in this country for four decades now, there are no reported cases of cancer or emphysema which can be attributed to marijuana."I suspect that breathing a day's worth of the air in Houston or any other city with poor air quality poses more of a threat than inhaling a day's dose http://www.leap.cc/events [ Post Comment ] Comment #13 posted by FoM on January 25, 2005 at 17:34:12 PT Off Topic: New Google Feature: Video I can't seen to find a video that works yet but in Google help it said stay tuned. This will be a nice feature if we can get video of news broadcast on marijuana from different news channels.http://video.google.com/ [ Post Comment ] Comment #12 posted by The GCW on January 25, 2005 at 16:42:24 PT Still less addictive than coffee. See the chart,http://www.drugwarfacts.org/addictiv.htmAddictive Qualities of Popular Drugs420Control the spirit of error like the plague.420The Green Collar Worker [ Post Comment ] Comment #11 posted by mayan on January 25, 2005 at 15:48:00 PT What About JAIL??? She fails to explain why someone who uses this plant belongs in JAIL. [ Post Comment ] Comment #10 posted by FoM on January 25, 2005 at 12:00:29 PT Related Article from Week - TV Top Official Warns Of Marijuana HazardsJanuary 25, 2005 A former White House drug official is in the River City to discuss the new hazards of marijuana.Doctor Andrea Barthwell talked with community members Tuesday morning at the White Oaks Center in Peoria.The drug abuse expert talked about the misconceptions of marijuana use.Barthwell is calling on Illinois lawmakers to prevent legalizing the drug.Barthwell said, ''Parents tend to think about marijuana the way they did a generation ago when they maybe were experimenting with it. They were starting at a later age. They were using a much lower potency product than we have today and the two issues of early initiation and higher potency marijuana are converging to make this problem bigger.''And Barthwell says more young people are in treatment for marijuana dependency than for alcohol or for all other illegal drugs combined. Copyright: 2005 WEEK-TVhttp://week.com/morenews/morenews-read.asp?n=6979 [ Post Comment ] Comment #9 posted by Hope on January 25, 2005 at 10:28:41 PT And of course the drug war toadies scattered throughout the media will see that her speeches get ink or air time. [ Post Comment ] Comment #8 posted by Hope on January 25, 2005 at 10:26:09 PT Kind of looks like Barthwell has taken the spiel she learned at the King's feet on the paid speaker's road. No one, among the sorts that hire paid speakers for one function or another, turns down an anti-drug "speech" or speaker, and I think she see's a political future for herself...therefore she has to get out there and be seen, and she's got that big anti-drug stuff she's so good at.I suspect, that besides income for the moment, she's going to milk it for all it's worth and for as long as she can. [ Post Comment ] Comment #7 posted by kaptinemo on January 25, 2005 at 10:10:32 PT: Time to track the money trail As FoM had mentioned, "Dr." Barthwell is off the Gub'mint dime...or is she? I would think she is, and is now in the employ of some NGO that is working, like the PFDFA, with both Big Pharma and Uncle.But there's one good thing about this. She is no longer backed legally by the crushing weight of Uncle's legal machinery. If her 'facts and figures' were challenged in open court, she'd have only her own defense, paid for by her, to protect her. She wants to spout her government inspired dreck as a private citizen, now? She wants to politick against NORML and MPP - as a private citizen - without Uncle's legal protection? By all means, have at it, girl! Just keep in mind Uncle isn't watching your legal back, anymore, "Doctor". [ Post Comment ] Comment #6 posted by FoM on January 25, 2005 at 09:38:45 PT afterburner That doesn't surprise me one little bit. Prozac is not something I'd ever take again. It made me so wacky. [ Post Comment ] Comment #5 posted by Hope on January 25, 2005 at 09:38:03 PT Well...duh! "They use the pain and suffering of patients and the natural compassion that we as Americans feel to change the drug laws in this country."When the drug laws are causing that pain and suffering...anything less than trying to change the, apparently, sacred, drug laws...would be wrong.God did not give us drug laws. They are, in no way,sacred...except perhaps to those who worship Mammon created by them. [ Post Comment ] Comment #4 posted by afterburner on January 25, 2005 at 09:29:38 PT NORML & Canadian Senate Report Call for Age Limit "When (baby boomers) look at their children's use of marijuana, they look at it through a lens of their own experience," Barthwell said. "And that lens creates an ability to think that marijuana use maybe isn't that harmful, but if you compound the fact that children are using at a younger age when the brain is developing and they're using a higher potency product, you can understand why we feel a need to inform parents about the real risk." --Dr. Andrea Barthwell, private citizenThe prohibitionists are always yapping about "the children," but what they don't realize is: we're not just fighting for our rights and our medicine; we're fighting for *our* children, and grandchildren!"Legalizing (marijuana) as a drug will set the clock of modern medicine back to a time when, as a young country, Americans were exposed to a host of often benign and sometimes deadly medicine 'cure-alls' sold from the back of a horse-drawn cart." --Dr. Andrea Barthwell, private citizenYes, instead of "a host of [FDA-approved] often benign and sometimes deadly medicine 'cure-alls' [like Vioxx, Aleve, Celebrex, Bextra and Prozac] sold from the back of a" pharmacy. Eli Lilly knew Prozac had 1200% higher suicide rate than other antidepressants [ Post Comment ] Comment #3 posted by Kozmo on January 25, 2005 at 09:17:01 PT Who is compassionate ? ," Barthwell said. "They use the pain and suffering of patients and the natural compassion that we as Americans feel to change the drug laws in this country."Just how much commpassion does Ms. Barthwell have when she advocates putting sick people in JAIL for using the drug that best aleviates thier pain ?????This woman has no clue what commpassion is. [ Post Comment ] Comment #2 posted by dididadadidit on January 25, 2005 at 08:26:56 PT Same Old "Bleep" "Dr. Andrea Barthwell, a former deputy director for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, - - -"She doesn't work for NDCP anymore, but that won't keep her from running around spreading the usual lies as a (better paid) private citizen.We on this site know, of course, the comsumption of high THC product is no more (in fact, less) dangerous than that of low THC and is like comparing scotch to 3.2% beer. One does not (mostly) chug or swill down scotch in the same way as beer, with a 12 ounce beer having less than 0.4 ounce of active ingredient alcohol, while 40% alcohol scotch would supply 4.8 ounces of alcohol in a 12 ounce serving (horrors, over 12 times as potent as the beer, maybe we better jail people for messin' with scotch). (Oh, wait a minute, we already did that with beer as well, didn't we.)Users of better (higher THC) product smoke less for the same resultant "high" (less smoking, less risk) just as drinkers don't chug scotch as they might beer.What bullbleep! Same old bleep! Bleep Barf Well and the elephant she rode in on.Cheers? [ Post Comment ] Comment #1 posted by FoM on January 25, 2005 at 07:59:34 PT Just a Comment It appears this lecture is over by the time it was scheduled in the article but I thought it was worth posting. I thought she didn't work for the government in this area anymore. [ Post Comment ] Post Comment