MARIJUANA grass or pot, a hallucinogen, is one of the most commonly abused illicit substances. Marijuana is the dried leaves seeds and flowers of the Cannabis sativa plant a species of Hemp. Not everyone who smokes marijuana is affected in the same way. Generally, the drug brings about a dreamy state, with some mental confusion and short-term memory loss.
This drug impairs short-term memory and learning, the ability to focus attention, and co-ordination. It also increases heart rate, can harm the lungs, and can cause psychosis in those at risk.
When smoked, or when heated and eaten, marijuana produces feelings of disorientation in space and time. Continued use of marijuana can lead to addiction and suppressed activity level referred to as motivational syndrome.
THE MAYO CLINIC STATES IN THEIR AUG. 25, 2006 ARTICLE "MARIJUANA AS MEDICINE: Consider the Pros and Cons," published on its website: "When smoked or ingested, THC and other cannabinoids in marijuana attach to two types of receptors on cells in your body - like keys in a lock - affecting the cells, once attached.
CB1 is one such receptor found mainly in your brain, especially in areas that control body movement, memory and vomiting. This helps explain why marijuana use affects balance and coordination and impairs short-term memory and learning, and why it can be useful in treating nausea, pain and loss of appetite.
The other type of receptor, CB2, is found in small numbers elsewhere in your body, mainly in tissue of the immune system, such as your spleen and lymph nodes. The function of these receptors is not well understood. They may serve as brakes on immune system function, which may help explain why marijuana suppresses your immune system.
After you smoke marijuana, its ingredients reach their peak levels in your body within minutes, and effects can last up to an hour and a half. When eaten - the plant is sometimes mixed with food - the ingredients can take several hours to reach their peak levels in your body, and their effects may last for hours."
Smoking marijuana deposits several times more THC into the blood than does eating or drinking the drug. Within a few minutes after inhaling marijuana smoke, an individual's heart begins beating more rapidly, the bronchial passages relax and become enlarged, and blood vessels in the eyes expand, making the eyes look red. The heart rate, normally 70 to 80 beats per minute, may increase by 20 to 50 beats per minute or, in some cases, even double. This effect can be greater if other drugs are taken with marijuana.
As THC enters the brain, it causes a user to feel euphoric - or 'high' - by acting in the brain's reward system, areas of the brain that respond to stimuli such as food and drink as well as most drugs of abuse. THC activates the reward system in the same way that nearly all drugs of abuse do, by stimulating brain cells to release the chemical dopamine.
A marijuana user may experience pleasant sensations, colours and sounds may seem more intense, and time appears to pass very slowly. The user's mouth feels dry, and he or she may suddenly become very hungry and thirsty. His or her hands may tremble and grow cold. The euphoria passes after awhile, and then the user may feel sleepy or depressed. Occasionally, marijuana use produces anxiety, fear, distrust, or panic."
Marijuana often referred to as a gateway drug, leads to other drug use. Hashish or Hash is a potent form of marijuana made from the flowering parts of the plant.
DESIGNER DRUGS:
A particularly dangerous and not uncommon practice is the combining of two or more drugs. The practice ranges from the co-administration of legal drugs, like alcohol and nicotine, to the dangerous random mixing of prescription drugs, to the deadly combination of heroin or cocaine with fentanyl (an opioid pain medication).
Illegal drugs are defined in the terms of their chemical formulas. To circumvent these legal restrictions, underground chemists modify the molecular structure of certain illegal drugs to produce analogs known as designer drugs. These drugs can be several hundred times stronger than the drugs they are designed to imitate.)
Because of drug-drug interactions, such practices often pose significantly higher risks than the already harmful individual drugs. Some combinations of drugs are inappropriate because of the chemical interactions between them. One drug might add to the effect of the other drug, resulting in overdose, or one drug might cancel the effectiveness of the other drug.
The narcotic analogs can cause symptoms such as those seen in Parkinson's disease: uncontrollable tremors, drooling, impaired speech, paralysis, and irreversible brain damage. Analogs of amphetamines and methamphetamines cause nausea, blurred vision, chills or sweating, and faintness. Psychological effects include anxiety, depression, and paranoia. As little as one dose can cause brain damage. The analogs of phencyclidine cause illusions, hallucinations, and impaired perception.
Smoking a drug or injecting it into a vein increases its addictive potential. Both smoked and injected drugs enter the brain within seconds, producing a powerful rush of pleasure. However, this intense "high" can fade within a few minutes, taking the abuser down to lower, more normal levels. It is a starkly felt contrast, and scientists believe that this low feeling drives individuals to repeated drug abuse in an attempt to recapture the high pleasurable state.
Although taking drugs at any age can lead to addiction, research shows that the earlier a person begins to use drugs the more likely they are to progress to more serious abuse.
(Information complied from various drug web sites.)