Today fam, I’m here to talk about unintended consequences. In particular those around cannabis

I will note that I am speaking anecdotally but would like to talk about something I’ve come to notice and I’m not seeing anyone talk about

When we look at the harm profile of cannabis it’s quite low compared to that of other drugs, such as synthetic cannabis or meth.

A lot of police time and money is spent hunting down cannabis crops and destroying them. During grow season you see the helicopter flying around

Now when this happens, there becomes issues with supply of cannabis. Your local area gets real dry

Now many dealers still need to deal something so they move to synthetics or meth. A number of people take up this offer and because meth is hella addictive people get hooked

It’s generally accepted that weed makes you chill af, meth does not make you chill. Also as I noted meth has a higher risk profile. It fucks up your body hard and leads to a lot of mental health issues - generally psychosis based, which then makes them more prone to aggression

Now when you’re on meth you have a lot of energy. Some people clean, others work out. A lot. Like a lot, a lot. So now you’ve got these people who are fucking ripped af, who need to become inpatient mental health users because they’ve got psychosis

Now this is where things get tricky. We don’t have a lot of inpatient capacity in NZ to properly address drug induced mental health problems. Like there’s maybe two sites in the country.

If you want to go to rehab, you need to dry out before you go

So now you’ve got this situation where inpatient MH staff are unable to manage these patients because when you’re in a psychosis meth rage and you’re a hulk, there’s no managing that, just trying not to get maimed. The facilities aren’t built to manage these incidents either

And the care isn’t tailored to you, so it’s hard to get proper treatment for your mental illness, it’s hard to dry out and there’s not really a clear pathway to getting clean and staying clean

My personal reckons on this, based on what I’ve seen and the stories I’ve been told, is that when the supply of cannabis is an issue, gangs will, and do turn to other selling other drugs. Meanwhile the police are pissing on a house fire and patting themselves on the back

I’m personally curious to see if legalising cannabis and ensuring consistent supply will lower the number of users of drugs such as synthetics or meth. My suspicious are that it will because a legal supplier won’t be pushing meth as an alternative.

But this is just my reckons.