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While NFL cracks down on marijuana, players are using as much as “a thousand Vicodins a month”
A study commissioned by ESPN and assisted by the National Institute on Drug Abuse shows retired NFL players misuse painkillers at a rate of 4-to-1 compared to the general public. “I was taking about 1,000 Vicodins a month,” former Miami Dolphins tight end Dan Johnson told ESPN. “People go, ‘That’s impossible. That’s crazy.’ No, it’s exactly what I was taking. I mean, believe me, I’d love to be off medications. That’s my worry every day, to make sure I have medication.”
While feds squash medical marijuana, they lament painkiller overdose deaths
The government claims to fight the War on Drugs in the name of our health and safety, yet they’re complicit in a rising addiction to opioid pharmaceuticals that killed more Americans in 2008 than have died in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the World Trade Center combined. Meanwhile, the Drug War they are fighting prevents us from applying the cure to this painkiller problem, since we have scientific evidence that cannabis works synergistically with opioids to deliver better pain relief with less pills, we have surveys showing medical marijuana patients are able to reduce their use of painkillers, cannabis has been shown to be a superior remedy for neuropathic pain, and doctors are now suggesting cannabis therapies for pain before opioid therapies because of cannabis’ non-toxicity and low risk of side effects.
The Top Ten Cannabis Science Stories of 2011
Today we continue our Year-End Retrospective with a look at the biggest news stories of scientific research into cannabis, public opinion polls on legalization, and statistical research on cannabis consumers. We call it The Top Ten Cannabis Science Stories of 2011.
DEA allowed 1200% increase in Oxycontin manufacturing during medical marijuana era
When I was in Orlando, the college kids of University of Central Florida told me about the “pill mill” epidemic referred to in this report. The way they described it, it sounded like the image our opponents paint of medical marijuana in California. ”Yeah, you can go to a shady little fake clinic,” one young man told me, “complain about pain, get a script from a shady doc, and get yourself 500 OxyContin pills, no problem.” Another told me of a friend of his who gets the OxyContin to sell so he can buy the ridiculously overpriced marijuana in Florida.
More workers testing positive for oxycodone, fewer testing positive for marijuana
As these marijuana workplace positives have declined we’ve seen regular marijuana use increase. In 2005, 5.9% of the adult population (18+) used marijuana monthly, a total of over 12.8 million regular users. By 2009 the percentage had reached 6.6% and nearly 15 million adults. So two million more marijuana users but 12,000 fewer marijuana positives? Sounds like we’re either getting better at beating pee tests or just not taking pee tests.
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