{"id":20216,"date":"2025-11-04T21:29:23","date_gmt":"2025-11-04T20:29:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=20216"},"modified":"2026-01-11T18:06:51","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T17:06:51","slug":"is-marijuana-an-effective-substitute-for-opioids","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2025\/11\/is-marijuana-an-effective-substitute-for-opioids\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Marijuana an Effective Substitute for Opioids?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">Dear friends,<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">We wanted to make sure you had seen four key studies from the past week:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: justify\">\n<li><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">A\u00a0<a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thelancet.com\/journals\/lanpub\/article\/PIIS2468-2667(18)30110-5\/fulltext\">groundbreaking study in <em>The Lancet<\/em><\/a>\u00a0found that\u00a0marijuana use over four years actually <strong>made it harder for patients to cope with chronic pain<\/strong>, and <strong>did not reduce their use of opioids<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">A <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.frontiersin.org\/journals\/psychiatry\/articles\/10.3389\/fpsyt.2018.00283\/full\">study in <em>Frontiers in Psychiatry<\/em><\/a> found that increasing self-exposure to non-medical marijuana was a predictor of <strong>greater odds of opioid dependence<\/strong> diagnosis.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">A <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.tandfonline.com\/doi\/full\/10.1080\/09540261.2018.1467385\">study in the <em>International Review of Psychiatry<\/em><\/a> found an <strong>increased rate of serious mental illness<\/strong> in states that had legalized medical marijuana.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\"><a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/jamanetwork.com\/journals\/jama\/article-abstract\/2688303\">In JAMA<\/a>: &#8220;(The) associated acute and long-term psychoactive effects on brain function (of marijuana) are&#8230;known. Expanding use of cannabis among pregnant and lactating women (as likely will occur with legalization) may lead to <strong>increased risk from fetal and child exposures<\/strong> if the teratogenic potential of cannabis remains underappreciated.&#8221;<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\"><strong><u>Additional Resources on Link Between Marijuana and Opioids<\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">These articles follow other warnings from medical professionals: the recent\u00a0<a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"http:\/\/r20.rs6.net\/tn.jsp?f=0012sOjlroX1QArZPzwV4Xy_Gxo7e-TTuZvoBXD6-eT_FxN2KO1xBG0J7WPNGmoAdhhF6wap5AlL9bfxdAVg-NkWtJWZgsOmiIzcmM3037K7bLmtXT8llHK8nclFSmj0k9bq0Ax_e6Rv2L_XxZGtZgOuA6IYqIW2tGJZqDLxlpHltJZxVMLUqQV4soq20iFFu7IqIvFhr6JvymGeQ4jhU4Mahte9S3a3hj5&amp;c=g00O2m7THO1-KIYnALmNIxMN1owuJeq96tr5xKOYWqk72yBZdal6qw==&amp;ch=ZZ5mq2Hhk3vVhYz5eTvCEQrXkzmSzHHIEq_8o-O7p3M7jDvlGHJhTQ==\">editorial<\/a>\u00a0published in the Journal of the Society for the Study of Addiction, which cautions against drawing policy conclusions from population studies, and the editorial comment from the American Society of Addiction Medicine on February 20, 2018. And don&#8217;t forget NIDA&#8217;s\u00a0<strong><a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/psychiatryonline.org\/doi\/full\/10.1176\/appi.ajp.2017.17040413\">rigorous study<\/a> showing pot users are twice as likely to have abused opioids and have an opioid use disorder than non-marijuana users<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">SAM has published a <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/learnaboutsam.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/27Sep2017-opioids-one-pager.pdf\">one-pager<\/a>\u00a0describing the overwhelming link between marijuana and opioid abuse. While not every marijuana user will go on to use heroin, <strong>nearly all heroin users previously abused marijuana<\/strong>. We need smart policies that discourage use, get people back on their feet, and restore people to participate in and contribute to society. States that have legalized marijuana, by contrast, see <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2017\/09\/02\/driving-high-is-clear-potent-danger\/\">increased drugged driving<\/a>, increased arrests of minority youth, and increased <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/health\/health-news\/er-visits-kids-rise-significantly-after-pot-legalized-colorado-n754781\">emergency room visits<\/a>. Colorado is experiencing the <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2018\/04\/04\/colorado-drug-overdoses-opioid-deaths-hit-high\/\">highest number of drug overdoses<\/a> in its history. Legalization is a failed experiment.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">Please visit <a style=\"color: #0000ff\" href=\"https:\/\/learnaboutsam.org\">learnaboutsam.org<\/a> to learn about a smarter approach.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">Sincerely,<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">\u00a0 Kevin Sabet<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">\u00a0 President, Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM)<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">\u00a0 Affiliated Fellow, Yale University<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\"><span style=\"font-family: verdana, geneva, sans-serif;font-size: 10pt;color: #0000ff\">Source: Email from reply@learnaboutsam.org July 2018<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dear friends, We wanted to make sure you had seen four key studies from the past week: A\u00a0groundbreaking study in The Lancet\u00a0found that\u00a0marijuana use over four years actually made it harder for patients to cope with chronic pain, and did not reduce their use of opioids.\u00a0 A study in Frontiers in Psychiatry found that increasing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63,30,41,90,34,135,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brain-and-behaviour","category-cannabis-marijuana","category-drug-use-effects-on-foetus","category-global-drug-legalisation-efforts","category-heroin-methadone","category-opioids","category-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20216"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20217,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216\/revisions\/20217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}