• An experiment helps heroin users test their street drugs for fentanyl

    Fentanyl has become a big part of the local drug supply in the Bronx
    NPR (US)
    Tuesday, May 16, 2017

    Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is "similar to morphine but can be 50 to 100 times more potent," according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Increasingly, drug dealers have been using fentanyl to cut their heroin supply — which can be lethal for users. By using the same simple test a doctor would use to check for fentanyl in a patient's urine, Van Asher, one of the staffers in charge of "transactions" — that means he gives out needles — is now giving drug users in the Bronx a way to quickly find out what's in their syringe before they inject.

  • Cannabis may help wean people off crack, study finds

    The results echo a smaller study of 25 crack users in Brazil
    The Globe and Mail (Canada)
    Tuesday, May 16, 2017

    canada crack vancouverCannabis has been identified as a potential substitute for users of legal or illicit opioids, but a new Vancouver-based study shows the drug may also help reduce people’s cravings for another highly addictive substance: crack cocaine. Scientists at the BC Centre on Substance Use tracked 122 people who consumed crack in and around Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside over a three-year period and found they reported using that drug less frequently when they opted to also consume cannabis. The findings do suggest that cannabinoids might play a role in reducing the harms of crack use for some people. (See also: Study: cannabis may reduce crack use | Therapeutic Use of Cannabis by Crack Addicts in Brazil)

  • Legal marijuana could earn millions for Swiss state

    Legal cannabis should benefit the federal coffers, as it is subject to a 25% tax and VAT levy, which should generate CHF30 million a year in tax revenue for the state
    Swissinfo (Switzerland)
    Tuesday, May 16, 2017

    Some 130 firms have registered with the Swiss federal authorities to sell legal pot that could generate CHF30 million ($30.2 million) in annual revenue for the state. Legal cannabis has become a flourishing business in recent months. Switzerland changed its laws in 2011 to let adults buy and use cannabis with up to 1% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) – the active ingredient that gets smokers high. So far, 130 retailers of legal cannabis have registered with the Federal Customs Administration to be taxed as tobacco producers, the Berner Zeitung reported. Swiss customs officials were in contact with 250 other potential producers. The customs administration confirmed that annual sales of legal pot in Switzerland amount to CHF100 million.

  • Ganja lobby wrong

    De La Haye counters claim he's anti-marijuana
    Jamaica Observer (Jamaica)
    Monday, May 15, 2017

    Winston de la HayeThe Ministry of Health (MoH) of Jamaica has indicated that it has begun taking steps to change the schedule class of marijuana to effect amendments to international treaties concerning the drug.Chief Medical Officer Dr Winston De La Haye made the disclosure at last week's post-Cabinet press briefing at Jamaica House after being asked to respond to accusations of him being labelled by ganja lobbyists as “anti-marijuana”. “They are wrong. We are lobbying to have it removed from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act that lists it as a criminal and narcotics substance,” he said. (See also: No ganja babies - Tufton vows to protect vulnerable from ill effects of marijuana | Two ganja licences approved)

  • Israel eases restrictions on medical marijuana use and possession

    New directives allow patients to use cannabis oil or vapor in public — but smoking outside your home is still banned
    Haaretz (Israel)
    Monday, May 15, 2017

    Israel's Health Ministry recently released new directives easing restrictions on the possession and use of medical marijuana by authorized users. The directives, which go into effect immediately, allow patients who have been prescribed marijuana to consume the drug in public as oil or as vapor. However, smoking cannabis, the method that most patients in Israel use, is still banned in public. Permits for the use of medical marijuana have until now been very strict: Patients were only allowed to use it at the address listed in the permit, usually their home, and not in the presence of another person. Possession of marijuana was also restricted to the user’s home.

  • Provinces diverge on approach to guidelines on legal marijuana

    Setting guidelines related to the minimum legal age, retail sales, public health, education and security are among the wide range of needs
    The Globe and Mail (Canada)
    Sunday, May 14, 2017

    Provinces have been protesting the large volume of work and heavy costs they say the Trudeau government has piled on them in its rush to legalize recreational cannabis across Canada by next year. Provinces have been busy since the federal government tabled legislation last month to legalize and regulate recreational marijuana use, with a primary aim of keeping weed out of the hands of youth and criminals. Ottawa hopes to make it happen by July 2018. Some provinces expressed concern about what they see as a hurried course set by Ottawa toward legalization.

  • Change in policy will not get rid of illegal cannabis cultivation: Dutch Ministries

    No matter which scenario is picked, there will still be illegal cultivation
    NL Times (Netherlands)
    Wednesday, May 10, 2017

    Little will change around illegal cannabis cultivation, even if the government changes the current tolerance policy, according to officials from the Ministries of Public Health and Security and Justice. The Dutch government is considering three scenarios: regulating both cannabis sales and cultivation, extending the tolerance policy to include growers, or a total ban on both growing and selling weed. In February a majority in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament, voted for regulated cannabis cultivation. When and if a change of law will be implemented is still unclear.

  • Daily dose of cannabis extract could reverse brain's decline in old age, study suggests

    Regular low doses of THC dramatically boosted memory and learning in older mice, say scientists, who plan a clinical trial in humans later this year
    The Guardian (UK)
    Monday, May 8, 2017

    Researchers have come up with an unusual proposal to slow, or even reverse, the cognitive decline that comes with old age: small, daily doses of cannabis extract. The idea emerged from tests on mice which found that regular, low doses of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) – the main psychoactive ingredient in cannabis – impaired memory and learning in young animals, but boosted the performance of old ones. The discovery has raised hopes for a treatment that improves brain function in old age without inducing the behavioural effects well known to recreational users of the drug.

  • Malta Government and opposition parties call for debate, with a view to legalising and regulating cannabis

    'Legalisation of recreational marijuana would not be a free-for-all'
    Malta Today (Malta)
    Saturday, May 6, 2017

    malta legalize 2012A Labour government would initiate discussions on the use of cannabis for recreational use in Malta, eventually leading to its regularisation and taking it out of the hands of drug traffickers, according to Prime Minister Joseph Muscat. The Labour Party is not alone in calling for a national discussion on the regularisation of cannabis. Both the Nationalist Party and the Partit Demokratiku are calling for a debate, seemingly making the three parties in favour of legalising recreational cannabis. Opposition leader Simon Busuttil called for a discussion based on scientific research, which would in turn provide an informed decision on its possible implementation.

  • Dagga Judgment: There are less drastic ways to deal with its harmful effects

    The state was unable to provide credible evidence about the uniquely harmful effects of cannabis
    The Daily Maverick (South Africa)
    Thursday, May 4, 2017

    south africa law crimeUntil 1921 dagga was sold openly by mine storekeepers in the towns and grew wild in much of South Africa. It was banned partly because it was feared that its use would make it more difficult to uphold racial segregation. Its possession and use was criminalised by the colonial regime in 1928 and this was done for political and so called “moral” reasons. The Western Cape High Court held that the relevant provisions in the Drugs Act and the Medicine and Related Substances Act which prohibit the possession and use of cannabis infringed on the right to privacy protected in section 14 of the Bill of Rights. In evaluating the evidence Judge Dennis Davis concluded that the evidence provided by the state to justify the criminalisation of dagga “was singularly unimpressive”.

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