Once I noticed Stanford Drugs’s article about hashish use in older adults, I anticipated balanced, evidence-based well being steerage. What I obtained as an alternative was a combination of professional medical recommendation wrapped in deceptive statistics, historic revisionism, and barely disguised pharmaceutical trade speaking factors.
Do not get me unsuitable – warnings about hashish use for seniors aren’t inherently unhealthy. Older adults do metabolize substances otherwise, and drug interactions with medicines are actual considerations price discussing. However when prestigious establishments like Stanford begin repeating debunked myths and cherry-picking information to color hashish as extra harmful than it really is, we have to name it out.
The article presents 5 details about hashish and older adults, and whereas some comprise nuggets of fact, others are so deceptive they border on disinformation. Let’s study what Stanford obtained proper, what they obtained spectacularly unsuitable, and why this issues for the hundreds of thousands of seniors exploring hashish as an alternative choice to prescription drugs which have failed them.
Stanford’s first level claims marijuana within the Seventies contained between 1% and 4% THC, in comparison with in the present day’s 20% common. That is the “weak weed fantasy” that must be put to relaxation completely, as a result of it is based mostly on essentially flawed information.
Sure, common industrial hashish in the present day is stronger than what most individuals smoked a long time in the past. However the declare that Seventies hashish maxed out at 3-4% THC is provably false. Ask any outdated hippie who was really there, and so they’ll inform you about strains like Acapulco Gold, Panama Crimson, Thai Stick, and unique Kush varieties from Afghanistan that may completely wreck you.
The parable comes from police seizure information the place hashish sat in proof rooms for months or years, uncovered to mild, warmth, and air – circumstances that quickly degrade THC. When authorities lastly examined these degraded samples, shock! Low THC ranges. This could be like leaving wine within the solar for six months after which declaring that each one wine from that period was vinegar.
Hash and hash oil have existed for hundreds of years with THC concentrations rivaling in the present day’s concentrates. Emerald Triangle growers within the 70s have been producing extremely potent hashish by way of selective breeding and cautious cultivation. The distinction is that in the present day’s authorized market makes high-potency merchandise extra broadly accessible and constantly labeled, not that people abruptly found out the way to make hashish robust.
Stanford additionally lumps artificial cannabinoids like K2 and Spice into their dialogue of hashish power, which is intellectually dishonest bordering on malpractice. These artificial compounds have fully completely different chemical buildings from THC and have been marketed as “authorized marijuana” exactly as a result of they are not hashish. Mentioning them in an article about hashish is like discussing methamphetamine dangers in an article about espresso – technically each are stimulants, however conflating them is ridiculous.
K2/Spice merchandise have brought about severe well being issues together with coronary heart assaults and psychotic episodes. Hashish has not. Conflating the 2 serves solely to confuse readers and inflate perceived hashish dangers.
Stanford’s heart specialist Dr. Joseph Wu presents hashish as a cardiovascular danger issue, citing research exhibiting 29% elevated coronary heart assault danger and 20% elevated stroke danger amongst common customers. These are regarding numbers that deserve examination – however additionally they deserve context that Stanford conveniently omits.
First, Wu himself acknowledges that hashish’s cardiovascular results “are decrease than these related to common tobacco or extreme alcohol consumption.” So why are we focusing institutional sources on warning seniors about hashish whereas alcohol commercials dominate tv and alcohol is obtainable in each grocery retailer?
Second, the article notes that “those that use hashish typically additionally use tobacco, alcohol or each” and that mixed use seems synergistic. This can be a essential confounding variable that makes attributing cardiovascular results solely to hashish scientifically problematic. If hashish customers additionally smoke cigarettes and drink alcohol, how do we all know hashish is the issue?
Third, and most significantly, the article fully ignores the huge physique of analysis exhibiting hashish use is related to diminished opioid use amongst continual ache sufferers. Which poses better cardiovascular danger: occasional hashish use, or each day high-dose opioid consumption with its well-documented impacts on coronary heart rhythm, respiratory despair, and overdose loss of life?
The declare that “there isn’t any protected quantity of hashish” for coronary heart well being deserves explicit scrutiny. This absolutist language echoes prohibition-era rhetoric and contradicts Stanford’s personal knowledgeable who notes that “THC in very small doses may be therapeutic.” Which is it – no protected quantity, or therapeutic in small doses?
Concerning most cancers dangers, Stanford claims hashish smoking is “linked to elevated danger of lung and head and neck cancers” however gives no citations for this declare. In the meantime, we now have population-level information exhibiting that locations with excessive hashish use do not present corresponding spikes in these cancers. Willie Nelson is 92 years outdated and has smoked hashish each day for many years. Snoop Dogg, Tommy Chong, Woody Harrelson – all heavy, long-term hashish customers with out the most cancers epidemic these research supposedly predict.
Correlation is not causation, and when your predictions do not match real-world outcomes over a long time, your correlations are in all probability spurious.
Stanford’s dependancy psychiatrist Dr. Smita Das claims “round 30% of standard hashish customers have what is called hashish use dysfunction.” This assertion takes DSM-V standards designed to pathologize regular conduct and presents it as medical reality.
The precise analysis exhibits hashish use dysfunction charges round 9% amongst customers – not 30%. That examine Das references? It is measuring one thing very completely different from what most individuals consider as “dependancy.” The DSM-V standards for hashish use dysfunction embody issues like “spending a whole lot of time acquiring or utilizing hashish” (which describes actually anybody who makes use of commonly), “tolerance” (which develops to any commonly used substance together with espresso), and “utilizing greater than meant” (which describes most individuals’s relationship with Netflix, pizza, or social media).
By these standards, 30% of espresso drinkers would have “caffeine use dysfunction,” 40% of smartphone customers would have “gadget use dysfunction,” and possibly 60% of individuals would have “meals use dysfunction.” The DSM-V is a pharmaceutical trade cookbook for prescribing medicines, and its increasing definitions of “dysfunction” conveniently create extra sufferers requiring pharmaceutical interventions.
Das “focuses on dependancy psychiatry” – which means her complete skilled id and revenue stream will depend on discovering and treating dependancy. This represents an enormous battle of curiosity that Stanford ought to have disclosed. It is like asking a roofer should you want a brand new roof; the reply is all the time going to be sure.
The article additionally fails to differentiate between bodily dependency and problematic use. Some common hashish customers expertise delicate withdrawal signs (irritability, sleep disruption) once they cease, however these are nowhere close to the severity of alcohol, benzodiazepine, or opioid withdrawal. Caffeine withdrawal is arguably worse than hashish withdrawal, but we do not see Stanford issuing dire warnings about espresso dependancy in seniors.
Stanford’s fourth level claims analysis on hashish efficacy is restricted, which might be a good assertion if we have been dwelling in 1995. We’re not. We’ve got a long time of worldwide analysis that the FDA merely refuses to acknowledge due to bureaucratic necessities designed to keep up pharmaceutical trade management.
The endocannabinoid system is well-studied. We perceive how cannabinoids work together with CB1 and CB2 receptors. We’ve got proof from Israel, Canada, Europe, and different nations the place analysis hasn’t been systematically obstructed. The declare that we do not have enough proof is simply true should you arbitrarily dismiss all non-FDA-approved analysis – which is precisely what Stanford is doing.
Examine this to mRNA vaccines, which have been researched, authorised, and mandated in file time throughout COVID with far much less long-term security information than we now have for hashish. The FDA abruptly found urgency and adaptability in its approval course of when pharmaceutical firms wanted it. The place’s that urgency for hashish analysis that would assist hundreds of thousands of continual ache sufferers scale back opioid dependence?
Stanford’s opposition to hashish as medication “partially as a result of there isn’t any proof that it could successfully deal with any psychiatric dysfunction” ignores in depth proof for PTSD, anxiousness, and despair remedy. The American Psychiatric Affiliation’s place that Das helped craft serves pharmaceutical pursuits, not affected person pursuits. Psychiatry is actually pharma’s distribution arm at this level, so their opposition to a non-patentable plant medication is predictable and self-serving.
The article’s remaining level – that seniors ought to talk about hashish use brazenly with healthcare suppliers – is completely right and probably the one unambiguously good recommendation within the piece. Older adults do metabolize substances otherwise, drug interactions with blood thinners and different medicines are actual, and medical supervision is smart.
The warnings about unintended overconsumption in edibles are additionally professional. Seniors unfamiliar with trendy hashish merchandise can simply take an excessive amount of, resulting in uncomfortable (although not harmful) experiences or pointless ER visits. This can be a actual drawback requiring higher schooling and clearer labeling.
The acknowledgment that hashish helps some sufferers scale back opioid use is essential, although Stanford buries this discovering deep within the article slightly than highlighting it because the potential public well being profit it represents.
What Stanford’s article fastidiously avoids discussing is why hashish stays federally prohibited regardless of overwhelming proof of medical utility and comparatively low danger in comparison with authorized prescription drugs. They do not point out pharmaceutical trade lobbying in opposition to legalization. They do not acknowledge that hashish threatens multi-billion-dollar markets for ache medicines, sleep aids, and anxiousness medication.
As a substitute, we get selective statistics, historic revisionism, and warnings calibrated to make hashish appear extra harmful than a long time of real-world use suggests it really is. This serves pharmaceutical pursuits whereas disserving seniors searching for alternate options to medicines which have failed them or brought about insupportable unwanted side effects.
Seniors deserve trustworthy, evidence-based steerage about hashish – together with each potential advantages and real dangers. What they do not deserve is prohibition-era propaganda dressed up as medical recommendation from prestigious establishments that ought to know higher.
DO SENIORS LOVE CANNABIS, READ ON…
