Devastating news: smoking marijuana can unlock latent mental illnesses such as bipolar I & II and schizophrenia in young brains.
Not news, really. I've suspected it since hearing the bipolar diagnosis from doctors in regard to some of my kids.
On the Airtalk show on KPCC today, Larry Mantle interviewed Gil Kerlikowske, the "drug czar" of this administration, as well as interviewing a researcher and a psychiatrist specializing in addiction.
Listen to it at: http://www.scpr.org/programs/airtalk/2010/12/16/teens-smoking-more-pot/
Other facts from the study just released by the National Institute on Drug Abuse:
Use of marijuana on a daily basis causes cognitive loss, especially in the ability to memorize and learn.
9% of marijuana users become addicted.
When it becomes a gateway drug, the most common drugs chosen are cocaine and methamphetamine--because they increase attention and focus.
Larry recommends seeing the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Next to Normal, which shows two teens, one who can use mj recreationally without too many side effects and his girlfriend, for whom mj immediately becomes addicting and destructive to her life.
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