Marijuana
The use of marijuana on college campuses is one of the mostcontentious issues facing the academic world today. Marijuana is widelyused within American society, despite widespread anti-drug lobbies andprevention campaigns. The effects of marijuana have been said to includeeffects on memory, negative social effects, and health effects like cancer,immune damage and respiratory problems. Additionally, anti-marijuanagroups often point to marijuana as a "gateway" drug, and note thatmarijuana use can potentially be dangerous while driving. In contrast,many scientists contend that marijuana is largely misunderstood, and mayhave many positive medical uses. Given this debate, it becomes difficultto determine how marijuana use should be regulated or prevented, especiallygiven the stunning inability of current approaches to stop the growth ofmarijuana use among young people. Decriminalization of the drug is onelikely candidate, coupled with stiff penalties for driving under theinfluence of marijuana, or selling marijuana to children. The complexitiesof both the political, social, and scientific aspects of this debate ensurethat the problem of marijuana use on college campuses will not
Marijuana contains some of the same chemicals known to cause cancer intobacco smoke. Marijuana Regulation and Prevention The regulation and prevention of marijuana use is a contentiousissue. One clear fact is that current prevention and regulation ofmarijuana are doing little to curb marijuana use among college students. After 60 years of the prohibition of marijuana, use continues to grow amongyoung people. Henry Wechsler, the Director of the College AlcoholStudy, notes " Prevention efforts aimed at illicit drug use should bestepped up and tied to those already in place for binge drinking andcigarette use. Smoking five joints per day is thought to be equivalent tosmoking a pack of cigarettes, at least in terms of the number of cancer-causing chemicals that are inhaled. Marijuana has many negative effects on human health. Some individualsare driven to use marijuana despite negative effects on family, school, andfriendships. These include use as a form of pain relief for glaucoma andmultiple sclerosis, as an appetite-enhancing drug for AIDs patients, and asurprising treatment for some sexual dysfunctions (Earleywine and Marlatt). Coughing, wheezing, chest colds, andlung infections like pneumonia are more common in marijuana smokers thanthe general population. A Memphis Tennessee study showed that 33 percent of recklessdrivers tested positive for marijuana, while 13 percent of reckless driverstested positive for both marijuana and cocaine. Further, people under the influence of marijuana can have difficultyreacting to changing road conditions, and accurately judging distances(National Institute for Drug Abuse). Marijuana is often smoked in the form ofcigarettes, in pipes, or through the use of modified large pipes calledbongs. Marijuana use putsyoung people in contact with a social group that uses and sells otherdrugs.
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