Wednesday, December 11, 2024
Topics Distortion 1: Drug Use After Prohibition Ends Distortion 2: Drug Use Estimates Distortion 3: Needle Exchange Distortion 4: Harm Reduction Distortion 5: Methadone Treatment Distortion 6: Emergency Room Visits Distortion 7: Gateway Distortion 8: Ecstasy Distortion 9: Cannabis As Medicine Distortion10: Young People and Drugs Distortion 11: Marijuana Potency Distortion 12: Cannabis and Driving Distortion 13: US Crime Rates Distortion 14: Cannabis and Drug Treatment Distortion 15: People Only Smoke Pot To Get High, Whereas They Drink Alcohol To Be Sociable Distortion 16: ONDCP's 'Open Letter on Marijuana' & the AntiDrug Media Campaign Distortion 17: Cannabis and Drug Treatment Part II Distortion 18: Cannabis and Mental Illness Special: NORML's Truth Report 2005, An Analysis & Response To The Drug Czar's Open Letter About Marijuana Special: Debunking The Myths Chronic Pain & Opiods, by Frank Fisher, MD Distortion 19: Estimating the Size of the Illicit Drug Market Distortion 20: Methamphetamines Distortion 21: US Crime Rates & Arrest Rates Distortion 22: Marijuana & Violence Search using CSDP's own search tool or use |
Distortion 7: Marijuana is a gateway drug that leads to heroin and cocaine addiction. False. The ‘gateway’ claim is a myth. Marijuana is the most widely used illicit drug so it is very likely that people who use less commonly-used drugs will have also tried marijuana. That does not mean marijuana led to hard drug use. The research indicates most marijuana users do not go onto use hard drugs; marijuana is more properly viewed as a strainer that catches most illicit drug users and they go no further. The numbers bear out these findings: According to the federal government 76.3 million people have tried marijuana, while only 2.78 million have ever tried heroin in their lifetimes and only 5.3 million have ever tried cocaine in their lives. The figures for monthly use are similar: 10.7 million Americans admit to being regular marijuana users, yet only 1.2 million admit to using cocaine each month - 1 for every 9 marijuana users - and 130,000 people use heroin monthly, or 1 for every 80 regular marijuana users. [Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, US Dept. of Health and Human Services, National Household Survey on Drug Use 2000 (Washington, DC: SAMHSA, 2001] The Journal of the American Medical Association features an article on 'gateway theory' in its Jan. 22/29, 2003 edition. According to the article, "Early Onset of Drug Use in Early-Onset Cannabis Users vs. Co-twin Controls," " While the findings of this study indicate that early cannabis use is associated with increased risks of progression to other illicit drug use and drug abuse/dependence, it is not possible to draw strong causal conclusions solely on the basis of the associations shown in this study."
Indeed, according to the study's authors:
Indeed, rather than cannabis, the research seems to point to early use of tobacco or alcohol as more of a predictor of later use of other drugs and of later problem drug use. The report notes that "While covariates differed between equations, early regular use of tobacco and alcohol emerged as the 2 factors most consistently associated with later illicit drug use and abuse/dependence. While early regular alcohol use did not emerge as a significant independent predictor of alcohol dependence, this finding should be treated with considerable caution, as our study did not provide an optimal strategy for assessing the effects of early alcohol use." Unsurprisingly, this research is being misreported in the popular press, see for example this article from the Boston Globe on Jan. 22, 2003, "Study On Twins Supports View Of Marijuana As A Gateway Drug." Fortunately, the article itself is available free online, and also a PDF of the full article is stored in the CSDP research section, along with a PDF of an accompanying editorial. The Institute of Medicine in 1999 dismissed the ‘gateway’ theory: "There is no conclusive evidence that the drug effects of marijuana are causally linked to the subsequent abuse of other illicit drugs." Source: Joy, Janet E., Stanley J. Watson Jr., and John A. Benson Jr., Division of Neuroscience and Behavioral Research, Institute of Medicine, "Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science Base (Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1999). The IOM report went further: "Patterns in progression of drug use from adolescence to adulthood are strikingly regular. Because it is the most widely used illicit drug, marijuana is predictably the first illicit drug most people encounter. Not surprisingly, most users of other illicit drugs have used marijuana first. In fact, most drug users begin with alcohol and nicotine before marijuana - usually before they are of legal age." Source: IOM, "Marijuana and Medicine: Assessing the Science Base," 1999.
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