The pro-mariju*na lobby has long claimed that mariju*na is not harmful. But in addition to several adverse health effects, a new study points to mental health problems. A Dutch study showed that cann*bis users are more likely to have psychosis. [To avoid blocking by Internet filters, I’m making annoying spelling changes names of certain substances.]

For those interested in other health effects of mar:juana, useful information is provided by National Institute on Drug Abuse. Some technical information is provided in the Workshop on Clinical Consequences of Marijuana – Abstracts and Speaker Biographies. The abstract of one paper, “Pulmonary/Respiratory Consequences of Marijvana” by Donald P. Tashkin, M.D., provided insights into the lung damage that mariguana brings:

First, habitual mariguana [spelling change mine] smoking can cause potentially serious airway pathology at a relatively early age despite the absence of any clinical or physiologic evidence of disease. Second, regular mariguana use appears to be at least as damaging to the epithelium of the central airways as the smoking of tobacco, despite the far smaller daily number of mariguana joints smoked by mariguana smokers (three to four joints) than the daily number of tobacco cigarettes smoked (>20), suggesting a more damaging effect of mariguana than tobacco per cigarette smoked.

Hopefully accurate information about the physical and mental health effects of mariguano (that’s my favorite incorrect spelling, suggestive of the kind of contaminants that ruthless drug dealers might add as filler) will help us weed out the myth that it’s harmless.