As drug legalization groups and the cannabis industry lobby to legalize cannabis across the United States, with initiatives to legalize marijuana on the November ballot in five more states, many experts warn this will only increase the physical and mental harm from the unregulated, high-potency cannabis.
President of the American Board of Pain Medicine and a vice president of the International Academy on the Science and Impacts of Cannabis, Dr. Ken Finn, said high potency cannabis use is being linked to poisonings in young children, as well as psychosis and schizophrenia in an increasing number of regular users.
"A lot of my colleagues that work in psychiatry and emergency medicine are seeing a sharp rise in marijuana-related psychosis," Finn told NTD's The Nation Speaks in an Oct. 1 interview.
Data from Europe ties these mental health problems to high levels of the THC chemical in cannabis that causes people to feel high, Finn said.
Ben Cort, author of "Weed, Inc.: The Truth About the Pot Lobby, THC, and the Commercial Marijuana Industry," said the reason that cannabis products are increasing their THC content is to offset the tolerance threshold existing users have developed to the compound.
"There's a very strong correlation to cannabis use of high potency with schizophrenia, although it the link of a causal effect has not clearly been proven but it's strongly suspected."
Just like in the alcohol industry, where roughly 20 percent of consumers drink 80 percent of the alcohol, seven percent of the consumers who buy cannabis represent 76 percent of sales, he added.
Many cannabis products labeled to contain CBD-a secondary chemical in cannabis that does help with relaxation but does not elicit euphoric states-actually contain THC, Finn warned.
Children will accidentally get a hold of edible cannabis products that often look like candy but because they are unregulated, is of super high THC potency, Cort said.
"Multinational corporate interests," which care a lot about profit, are behind the cannabis industry, Cort said.
The marijuana industry has little to no regulation and is similar to how the tobacco industry used to be before the public was made aware of the health risks and some guardrails were put in place, Cort said.
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