cannabisnews.com: Gateway To Nowhere? Pot Doesn't Lead To Heroin





Gateway To Nowhere? Pot Doesn't Lead To Heroin
Posted by CN Staff on July 20, 2006 at 10:24:09 PT
By Ryan Grim
Source: Slate
USA -- Earlier this month, professor Yasmin Hurd of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine released a study showing that rats exposed to the main ingredient in marijuana during their adolescence showed a greater sensitivity to heroin as adults. The wire lit up with articles announcing confirmation for the "gateway theory" — the claim that marijuana use leads to harder drugs.It's a theory that has long seemed to make intuitive sense, but remained unproven. The federal government's last National Survey on Drug Use and Health, conducted in 2004, counted about 97 million Americans who have tried marijuana, compared to 3 million who have tried heroin (166,000 had used it in the previous month). 
That's not much of a rush through the gateway. And a number of studies have demonstrated that your chances of becoming an addict are higher if addiction runs in your family, or if heroin is readily available in your community, or if you're a risk-taker. These factors can account for the total number of heroin addicts, which could make the gateway theory superfluous.On close inspection, Hurd's research, published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, doesn't show otherwise. For the most part, it's a blow to the gateway theory. To be sure, Hurd found that rats who got high on pot as adolescents used more heroin once they were addicted. But she found no evidence that they were more likely to become addicted than the rats in the control group who'd never been exposed to delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, marijuana's main ingredient.Hurd began with two groups of rats. The first was administered THC every three days during their early adolescence (beginning at 28 days old) to approximate the sporadic marijuana use of American teens. The second group was given no drugs. Then, at mid-adolescence (56 days), both groups began a heroin regime. Hurd started by giving the rats a low dose of the harder drug. None of them got hooked. So, she doubled the fix. Each cage was equipped with an active and an inactive bar. Depressing the active bar when a white light was on gave the rats a hit of heroin; if they hit the bar regularly, that indicated addiction. Rats in both groups hit the active bar at least twice as often as they did the inactive one, which means they became addicted at roughly the same rate. The difference between the groups came post-addiction: For the first 15 heroin sessions, both sets used generally equal amounts of heroin. Then the control rats leveled off. But the pot rats kept taking more of the drug, leveling off at about a 25 percent higher dosage. This increased use was evidence of their greater sensitivity to heroin. Hurd says that because the marijuana-exposed rats demonstrated this heightened sensitivity, she expected them to be more motivated in pursuing the drug. But they weren't. The control rats paced their cages and repeatedly pressed the active bars even when the light indicating availability wasn't on. The pot rats, on the other hand, figured out that the heroin was available only at certain times, and that pacing and tapping the bar incessantly wasn't worth the trouble. When heroin was available, the marijuana rats took more of it. But when it wasn't, they chilled in the corner.Extrapolate the study to human behavior, Hurd says, and it suggests that teenagers who smoke pot are no more likely than other kids to become addicted to heroin. (Her study doesn't speak to whether they'd be more likely to try the drug.) If teens do get hooked on the hard drug, though, they may develop a stronger addiction. Hurd's results come on the heels of another marijuana finding that's not what the drug's opponents want to hear. Donald Tashkin, a UCLA medical with funding from the NIH's National Institute on Drug Abuse, looked at more than 1,200 people with cancers typically associated with cigarette smoking and a control group of more than 1,000 people without cancer. To his surprise, he found no link between marijuana and increased risk of cancer, even among the heaviest pot smokers. The results of Tashkin's study, the largest of its kind that's been done, will soon appear in the journal Cancer Epidemiology Biomarker and Prevention.There are a couple of plausible explanations for Tashkin's finding. Research finds that smoking less than a pack of cigarettes a day leads to only a slightly higher cancer risk than not smoking at all. It's two packs a day that triggers a much higher risk. Two packs is the equivalent of 10 joints—more marijuana than almost anyone smokes. Tashkin speculates that the risk threshold for pot might be too high to measure in the United States. "One would have to repeat the study in a society such as Jamaica," he says. Another possibility, according to Tashkin, is that marijuana's cancer-fighting elements and its carcinogens counteract each other. Animal studies have shown that THC has an inhibitory effect on a number of cancers. Marijuana also contains dozens of active cannabinoids, several of which have been shown to block cancer cell growth.Tashkin's findings do not mean that marijuana is harmless. In previous work, he has shown that pot smoke leads to chronic and acute bronchitis at the same elevated rate as tobacco smoke. He is currently studying the drug's relationship to pneumonia. But his latest results about cancer risk, like Hurd's on the gateway theory, make pot seem more rather than less benign. The federal government has announced the results of Tashkin's past studies with press conferences and subway ads. Don't look for any this time around.Complete Title: Gateway To Nowhere? The Evidence That Pot Doesn't Lead To HeroinSource: Slate (US Web)Author: Ryan GrimPublished: Thursday, July 20, 2006Copyright: 2006 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive Co. LLCContact: letters slate.comWebsite: http://www.slate.com/URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2146214/Related Article:Bringing The Gateway Theory Backhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread21968.shtmlCannabisNews -- Cannabis Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/cannabis.shtml 
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Comment #9 posted by WolfgangWylde on July 23, 2006 at 08:00:42 PT
You know, I've read a half dozen...
...or so articles on this study in the mainstream press, and not one of them mentioned that both groups of rats became addicted at the same rate.  Don't journalists do journalism anymore?
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Comment #8 posted by unkat27 on July 21, 2006 at 05:08:39 PT
Prison Addictions
Somehow i just don't think "rats confined to cages" really proves much about humans behavior, unless those humans are confined to cages also. The funny thing is, i think all this says more about people who have been confined to prison than people with more freedom to move about. By confining cannabis users to prison cages, the US govt makes them more susceptible to drug addiction. Go figure, do they really give a damn?
The State of the U.S. Prison Industrial Complex
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Comment #7 posted by charmed quark on July 20, 2006 at 16:45:44 PT
I think this study demonstrate the opposite
The control rats constantly hit the bar, even when there was no indicator light on and acted restless in-between doses. The THC rats were more layed back about the heroin, only hitting the bar when they knew they would get some.This study either shows the THC exposed rats were smarter (only hitting the bar when they knew it would work)or they were less dependent on the heroin, as they didn't seek it when they knew it wasn't available. The pacing and seeking of the control rats sounds a lot like addicted drug seeking to me.
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Comment #6 posted by greenmed on July 20, 2006 at 14:25:20 PT
good article
The biochemical gateway theory seems to finally bite the dust.As Whig points out (Comment #2), THC apparently desensitizes rather than sensitizes the reinforcing effects of heroin. Would it not follow that prior cannabis exposure would lessen the reinforcing properties of a single initial dose? Might cannabis actually "innoculate" against heroin addiction?If there has to be a gateway theory, it cannot be explained in the lab with rats. It is a sociological gateway that is maintained by cannabis prohibition.
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Comment #5 posted by museman on July 20, 2006 at 13:48:49 PT
ignorance knows no bounds
"It's a theory that has long seemed to make intuitive sense.."How can minds that repeatedly deny any such faculty as 'the intutitve' as having any 'scientific validity' get to claim such hypocritical statements?Twist the words, rewrite the meanings-including forcing academic definitions - to reflect the 'appropriate agenda' of the status quo, ignore facts and findings that overwhelmingly debunk such embecilic beliefs. This is how it's done. Power ensures that your word gets into the mix even if it is the most stupiddest thing one has ever heard. Wealth almost guarantees this kind of power. The politicians are all ass-kissers, EVERY SINGLE ONE! Even Nader is suspect in my book at this point, because he does support the infrastructure which propagates this crap. The old world is dying, why keep trying to save it? Let it die so we can get on with it. Stop supporting lies. If you vote for a lesser lie, it is still a lie.In 1973 I tried heroin for the first (and only) time. Not so that I could 'get high' or find 'something more powerful than marijuana' but so I would know for myself what it was. All the fed propaganda about everything else was full of BS, so why not heroin?Well for me it was like shooting Satan into my veins, and I was blessed that this was before AIDS because that needle was dirty, and the wound got infected. Fortunately I also missed out on Hep as well. The only gateway that Marijuana is is a gateway to health, understanding, spiritual awareness, increased intelligence, and sanity. I think that that is the gateway they are really worried about.But I'm willing to bet that 99% of prohibitionists are either alcoholics, or fanatical xtians hooked on their favorite addiction of judgement, prejudice, and bigotry - the gateways to world destruction.I'll take my chosen 'gate' anytime over theirs.
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Comment #4 posted by Sam Adams on July 20, 2006 at 12:38:42 PT
rat in me kitchen
OK, more reggae lyrics - this time, UB40's "Rat in the kitchen"...great song.....There's a rat in me kitchen what am I gonna do? There's a rat in me kitchen what am I gonna go? I'm gonna fix that rat thats what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna fix that rat. When you open your mouth you don't talk, you shout And you give every body the blame, But when they catch you up, They will shut you up And you got no one to blamewhen yo deh pon the scene, You make everyone scream Because they know you're so unjust But when they catch you up They will kick you up Because you someone they cannot trust 
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Comment #3 posted by Christen-Mitchell on July 20, 2006 at 12:37:34 PT:
Harry Anslinger Was Right The First time
Please pardon me, I can't resist posting this again. this time under a more appropriate story.During the House hearings in the Ways and Means Committee that led to the passing of the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937, Representative Dingell asked this question to the Commissioner of the newly created Narcotics Bureau: "I was just wondering whether the Marijuana addict graduates into heroin, an opium, or a cocaine user? Harry Anslinger's answer: "No, Sir. I have not heard of a single case of that kind. I think it is an entirely different class. The marijuana addict does not go in that direction," Eighteen years later, in response to a similar question by Senator Price Daniel, he replied: "That is the great problem, and our great concern about the use of marijuana is that eventually, if used over a long period of time, it does lead to heroin addiction." 
Hemptopia - Our Greener Future
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Comment #2 posted by whig on July 20, 2006 at 12:18:00 PT
Wrong interpretations
The difference between the groups came post-addiction: For the first 15 heroin sessions, both sets used generally equal amounts of heroin. Then the control rats leveled off. But the pot rats kept taking more of the drug, leveling off at about a 25 percent higher dosage. This increased use was evidence of their greater sensitivity to heroin.No, this increased use is evidence of lesser sensitivity to heroin, inasmuch as it took a greater dose to provide the same desired effect.Hurd says that because the marijuana-exposed rats demonstrated this heightened sensitivity, she expected them to be more motivated in pursuing the drug. But they weren't. The control rats paced their cages and repeatedly pressed the active bars even when the light indicating availability wasn't on. The pot rats, on the other hand, figured out that the heroin was available only at certain times, and that pacing and tapping the bar incessantly wasn't worth the trouble. When heroin was available, the marijuana rats took more of it. But when it wasn't, they chilled in the corner.Again, confirming a lesser sensitivity, and moreover a reduction in withdrawal anxiety meaning that the cannabis-treated rats were relatively less addicted to heroin.
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Comment #1 posted by lombar on July 20, 2006 at 11:37:09 PT
I knew I smelled a rat...
..about that study.Sorry, I could not resist the pun.
Tashkin's findings do not mean that marijuana is harmless. In previous work, he has shown that pot smoke leads to chronic and acute bronchitis at the same elevated rate as tobacco smoke. 
Harmless? Is the toxic soup we city dwellers call air 'harmless'? Is the pollutant laden water 'harmless'? I think someone should send him a volcano ...I can assert positively that since I quit smoking ciggarettes, I stopped having regular bouts of respiratory illness, I stopped getting colds all the time(probably hand-to-mouth exposure to bacterium more than smoke itself), and I stopped having a throat full of phlegm. I continued to smoke cannabis for years after but still did not have colds/bronchitis. I was being treated for asthma but again, the symptoms of that have retreated to the point of non-existant... So I can say smoking tobacco was more harmful in my experience than smoking cannabis alone... of course I could never afford to smoke 20+ 1 gram joints per day... 
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