Walking the halls of the high school that helped him get sober, it was easy for Jackson Wiechert to smile as he greeted former teachers and his principal.
Now he’s in college, planning to work in addiction recovery, but when he was sent to Independence Academy in Brockton, his path was far different.
Wiechert was, in his words, addicted to cannabis. Here’s how he described his typical high school day before recovery.
“I’d wake up, smoke weed. I probably fight with my dad a little bit before school, leave for school, smoke weed before I get into school. Go to my first class. After that class, go smoke weed in the bathroom. Smoke weed after every class,” he said.
The result was memory loss and anxiety so bad “I’d shake in class if I wasn’t high,” he said.
At the time, he didn’t know that cannabis, especially the high-potency products he was using, could cause these symptoms.
“I was told that it helps. It’ll ease your anxiety,” he said.
Barbara Wiechert, Jackson’s mom, now knows today’s regulated cannabis has much stronger THC levels than what she used to smoke. She didn’t know that or its risks when her son was struggling.
“I didn’t realize how much more dangerous and addicting it could be,” she said.
He was hardly alone in dealing with problems caused by cannabis use, according to Independence Academy principal Ryan Morgan.
When Morgan started at the school in 2014, he said most students were there for problems related to opioids.
“But with legalization in 2016 and dispensaries opening in 2018, 90 percent of the kids that we see are coming here for cannabis,” he said.
As 5 Investigates has reported, physicians, addiction specialists, mental health clinicians and others working with young people are warning that high-potency cannabis products are causing serious harm to some young people.
Ignorance of the risks is also widespread, causing public health advocates to say there is an urgent need to educate kids and parents about the risks of today’s cannabis.
State law also requires it. The law, passed first in 2017 and then amended in 2022, says the state must have “science-based public awareness campaigns” about the “health risks associated with marijuana and (THC) consumption” and other issues.
But the legislature has not funded any cannabis-focused public awareness campaigns in more than five years, even as Massachusetts is collecting more money than ever in tax revenue from cannabis sales: nearly $290 million collected last fiscal year.
This year, the state Cannabis Control Commission is again requesting money for a public awareness campaign: $1.5 million, which amounts to 0.5% of what was collected in cannabis taxes last fiscal year.
The last time the legislature funded the public awareness campaign was in 2020.
“We’re going to be working with the legislature,” Shannon O’Brien, chair of the Cannabis Control Commission, said in an interview. “So I’m hoping we can make the pitch, but I know the budget’s tight right now, and I know that a lot of parts of state government may or may not get funded.”
O’Brien said past problems with the commission may have made the legislature reluctant to offer up the money.
“We have seen some problems that were reported by the state auditor, and I think that there is some skepticism on the part of the legislature about whether or not we’re going to spend those funds appropriately,” she said.
5 Investigates asked Gov. Maura Healey, Senate President Karen Spilka and House Speaker Ronald Mariano for a response.
Healey’s office referred questions to the state Department of Public Health, which acknowledged no funding had been specifically allocated for a cannabis public awareness campaign since 2018.
“In addition to providing free prevention materials for any parents, caregivers, and other trusted adults working with youth, we have a robust drug education curriculum for schools, which includes educational material about cannabis and other substances, and we recently launched a curriculum specifically for parents and caregivers,” a DPH spokesperson said in a statement.
DPH’s Bureau of Substance Addiction Services is supported by marijuana tax funds, and the bureau supports “numerous prevention and intervention efforts that address cannabis use,” the spokesperson said.
Senate President Spilka’s office pointed to legislation passed in the Senate last year that would direct the Cannabis Control Commission to study the mental health impacts of cannabis.
Regarding the latest request to fund a public awareness campaign, a spokesperson said in a statement that “Senate President Spilka takes the public health impacts of cannabis seriously. Along with her colleagues, she is reviewing this funding request in the context of a budget year made more challenging by President Trump’s reckless and unnecessary cuts to programs that support Massachusetts families.”
A spokesperson for House Speaker Ronald Mariano responded with a statement that didn’t address the unfunded public health campaign but pointed to the legislature’s increasing funding for the Cannabis Control Commission from $9.15 million in fiscal year 2020 to $16.26 million now.
The lack of funding makes no sense to the Wiecherts.
“We’re told about other types of potential dangers, even down to icy roads, ‘Don’t go out because it’s dangerous,'” Barbara Wiechert said. “I think if there had been more education and knowledge about what to look for, parents, teachers, administrators might’ve been a bit more on top of it.”
Jackson Wiechert said more awareness would have made a difference for him, too.
“If I knew what it would send me into, I don’t think I would’ve used it or used it as much as I did,” he said.
We asked physicians and researchers for scientifically sound research on cannabis, young users and mental health. Here are links to what they provided.
Watch an extended interview with Dr. Aaron Quiggle, the medical director of Mass General Hospital’s Addiction Recovery Management Service, about the impact of cannabis on clients the ARMS clinics serve:
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