Our country just “celebrated” April 20, unofficially known as “national weed day,” a time when students all over the country collect on their college greens to smoke marijuana and jeopardize their mental and physical health.
We are moving in the wrong direction when it comes to cannabis and all related products, from high THC-content marijuana joints to gummies to vapes.
Despite a growing public evidence of the drug’s risks and despite its increasing potency that compounds these risks, the Trump administration is reclassifying marijuana on the Drug Enforcement Administration’s classification from Schedule I to Schedule III, as acting Attorney General Todd Blanche announced on April 23.
Drugs on Schedule I, including heroin and LSD, are considered to have high potential for abuse (dependency) with no currently accepted medical uses. Drugs listed on Schedule II, which include Adderall and oxycodone, have a high potential for abuse but some accepted medical uses.
Schedule III, which includes testosterone and buprenorphine, are drugs with moderate to low potential for addiction and accepted medical uses in the United States.
This is the wrong decision and will only further fuel the fire for liberalization and legalization of marijuana, shown to lead to expansion of shadow industries in states like Colorado, California, Oregon and New York, where recreational marijuana use has been legal for years.
Medical marijuana use has also been shown to lead to increase risks of dependency, as well as associated increases in illicit use and cannabis use disorders.
Keep in mind that the THC (psychoactive chemical) content of cannabis continues to rise dramatically, with dried flower and buds (joints are rolled from these) now having more than 15% THC, rising from 4% in the 1990s.
Some edibles contain close to 10 milligrams per serving, and concentrates range from 60 to 90% THC. These increasing concentrations pose increasing health risks.
The University of California San Diego School of Medicine recently studied 11,000 children starting at ages 9 to 10 through ages 16 and 17, with the results published in Neuropsychopharmacology. It was the largest long-term study of brain development in U.S. youth.
The study determined that teens who start using cannabis show slower gains in memory, attention and thinking skills, and that memory worsens over time during critical stages of brain development.
Other recent studies are equally damning. Chronic cannabis use has been shown to increase the risk of oral cancer, serve as a gateway drug to tobacco and impair driving, with more than 40% of drivers in serious, fatal car crashes testing positive for cannabis. It also has been shown to increase risk of heart attack, stroke and heart failure.
Though older adults may use it to treat pain, sleep disturbances and anxiety, recent studies have shown that cannabis products with high amounts of THC only slightly reduce pain and could increase anxiety to the point of psychosis.
An increasing number of women are using marijuana to treat morning sickness during the first trimester of pregnancy, despite the fact that it can lead to low birth weight infants and abnormal neurological development.
In fact, though 40 states have approved cannabis for medicinal use, it is not entirely clear what these strict scientific uses are. There are suggestions marijuana can help with chronic pain, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis-related muscle spasms, HIV/AIDS, Alzheimer’s disease, cancer and post-traumatic stress disorder. In practice, medical marijuana is used for other medical conditions, too.
As a result, cannabis use is very well studied despite its Schedule I status, so the notion that changing it to Schedule III will make research more likely is presumptive at best.
Consider again what the designations indicate: Schedule I drugs are considered by the DEA to have a high potential for abuse and no accepted medical uses.
Even if you want to stretch the science and make the argument that cannabis might have some medical use but is highly addictive and potentially dangerous, this would be Schedule II, not Schedule III. Schedule III is reserved for medications with proven medical uses and low addictive potential.
This is clearly not marijuana.
Consider that Adderall is Schedule II and testosterone is Schedule III. I can’t believe anyone would make the case that cannabis products ‒ which can lead to heart disease, memory and judgement problems, as well as psychosis and pregnancy risks ‒ are safer than Adderall or as safe as testosterone.
Studies show that people who use cannabis have at least a 30% chance of becoming addicted. This leads to both short- and long-term consequences.
It is a mistake for the president or his administration to change this high potency addictive drug to DEA Schedule III.
Marc Siegel, MD, is a clinical professor of medicine and medical director of Doctor Radio at New York University Langone Health. He is a Fox News senior medical analyst and author of the No. 1 New York Times bestseller “The Miracles Among Us.”