The most potent cannabis is to be counted as a hard drug in the Netherlands in future, RTL television news reports. The cabinet is to take a decision about the change on Friday, government sources say.
The hashish and marijuana presently sold in the Netherlands contain an average of 18 percent of the psychoactive substance THC. Continual high doses of THC can lead to addiction or even cause psychosis. Under the new policy, cannabis containing high THC levels will have the same status as heroin or cocaine.
The cabinet based its decision on recommendations by the Garretsen Commission presented earlier this year. The commission concluded that cannabis containing more than 15 percent THC should be counted as a hard drug.
In practice the decision means that if cannabis is found to be above the limit, its sale will no longer be tolerated. Soft drugs are not legal in the Netherlands, but small quantities of cannabis are allowed to be sold openly in so-called coffeeshops.
(mb/hs)
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This stance on cannabis is purely political rather than scientific. It was shown in Dr. Donald Abrams' published cannabis vaporization study in the US that individuals quickly titrate their THC doses to the same blood plasma level, regardless of the potency of the cannabis they're using. In other words: lower potency cannabis, just leads users to smoke more. And smoking lower potency marijuana exposes the user to more combustion products. The mental health issues stemming from THC exposure seem to only affect an extremely small percentage of individuals that are already predisposed to early-adult onset schizophrenia and only if their THC exposure takes place while their brains are developing during adolescence. Even this small risk should be mitigated by breeding cannabis with slightly more CBD, another cannabinoid, rather than reducing its THC content. Politicians should base their drug policies on science, rather than ideology.
same old story in a new jacket...
With stronger weed you can use less cannabis per joint/reefer, it is just a matter of dosage. We do not drink wodka from beer mugs also....
"It is relatively easy to die of the consumption of alcohol, it is impossible to die of the consumption of cannabis."
A weed-grower walks in to a coffeeshop, and addresses the owner: " Hey, coffeeshopboss, do you want to buy some good weed?" The coffeeshopboss takes a look at the merchandise, and sees the guy grew som high potency bud, covered with THC glands. "Sorry mate, Minister Opstelten told me I can not buy top grade weed anymore, you'd better try to sell this stuff to the kids on the streets...."
What complete hogwash. They've been smoking this strong weed for how many years? And now it's a problem? I think one of the previous posters had it right, it's all about that Euro!!
Hows that gonna work then? Since it's illegal to supply the coffeeshops in the first place. Who is going to test the strength? Not to mention THC degrades over quite a short period of time if not kept properly. Also theres little imported hash that even gets close to 18% THC. So the dutch are going to rely on import hash and weed? Every ounce of that has blood on it. Are the dutch going to be reduced to smoking highly dangerous and contaminated "soapbar" like us poor brits.
Amsterdamn with no weed? yeah, right I don't think holland's GDP can take that kind of hit. do you?
What a terrific commission the Garretsen Commission must be. They came up with all sorts of rules and at the end of the day, got paid for their work. I'm sure it doesn't matter to them that it's all meaningless. It's the equivalent of banning wine because it's got twice the alcohol of beer.
"THC can lead to addiction or even cause psychosis"...Awesome, would you want a medical doctor performing a heart operation on you? Would you want your pilot and co-pilot flying you over the ocean? At the end of the day, awesome, you will find you know nothing about drug addiction.
I don't really understand what you are getting at here.
I would prefer a surgeon performed surgery on me, and I prefer to have pilots at the controls when I fly on a plane.
Why would anyone prefer to have no pilot on a plane trip?
I don't get it.
When will governments let go of their fear, paranoia and destructive attitude towards cannabis? The fact is, it's all about money, hemp and cannabis can rival major established industries and the media are desperate to paint a negative picture of cannabis where ever possible for that reason. Cigarettes are addictive and kill, why is nobody being arrested for having their life ruined for smoking tobacco? Or alcohol for that matter? Oh, and as for cannabis being 'addictive', what complete moron wrote that?
As far as I am aware, no one ever died from cannabis. This can’t be said for that well known ‘hard drug’, alcohol that claims many sick and fatal victims every year.
However, according to reliable research, frequent consumption of very high THC cannabis is addictive and/or mentally destabilising for certain, vulnerable individuals and in ‘normal’ individuals regular abuse of large quantities of THC has a markedly deleterious effects on motivation and physical ability.
I am not a cannabis smoker and don’t have a vested interest, but to me the sensible solution would be to legalise and regulate it as a standardised product with permitted levels of THC determined by objective, scientific advice.
IS this a right wing radio station?
Im from the UK, i was always amazed at the Dutch for their forward thinking on cannabis. Now it appears they have just fallen prey to the right wing propaganda machine. Studies have shown that because our body already contains cannabinoids, the Brain titrates the dosage.
Just because some people think that you can gain a tolerance to cannabis this automatically shows that its addictive.
Read:MARIJUANA TOLERANCE: EQUILIBRIUM, NOT ADDICTION
http://www.marijuanalibrary.org/brain2.html
You should get your facts straight before releasing this trash into the public domain. Disgusting, i expected something way more intelligent from the Dutch Media.