Quiz 4: Marijuana

1. What is marijuana? What are the 2 main components? What do they do?
Marijuana is a mixture of dried-out leaves, stems, flowers and seeds of the female hemp plant. It
is usually green, brown or gray in color. It is a weed of the family cannabis; sativa, Indica and
ruderalis. The plant contains two group of chemical compounds: Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC)
the responsible for a the euphoric high and a newbie for many, cannabidiols oils (CBD), the non-
psychoactive compound.

2. What is the endocannabinoid system? What is anandamide? Who isolated anandamide?

The endocannabinoid system is a biological system composed of endocannabinoids, which are
endogenous lipid-based retrograde neurotransmitters that bind to cannabinoid receptors, and
cannabinoid receptor proteins that are expressed throughout the mammalian central nervous
system and peripheral nervous system. Anandamide is a cannabinoid neurotransmitter that is part
of the endocannabinoid system. This biological system is wide-reaching throughout the body and
brain, and it is responsible for many different effects. Anandamide has widespread effects on the
body because it interacts with the endocannabinoid system. Anandamide plays a part in reward,
mood, appetite, pain relief, and reproduction, among many other functions. On March 24, 1992,
Lumír Hanuš, a Czech analytical chemist working in Israel with American pharmacologist
William Devane, isolated the first known endocannabinoid in the human brain. They named it
anandamide, after the Sanskrit word for joy or bliss.

3. List 5 places in the body impacted by anandamide and other endocannabinoids:

The brain, adipose, tissue, liver, and the skeletal muscle.

4. How marijuana affects memory. Could this situation be a good or positive effect?
While further research on marijuana and memory is needed, there is some evidence that heavy,
long-term marijuana use may have negative effects on memory. However, most short-term
effects of marijuana on memory are fleeting. CBD, which isn’t psychoactive may have benefits
in terms of improving memory and cognition in some people. There’s also evidence that the
earlier you begin using marijuana, the more negative effects it can have on your cognition and
memory, so this is something to be aware of as well.

5. Can marijuana affect your driving? How marijuana affect your driving?
Marijuana significantly impairs judgment, motor coordination, and reaction time, and studies
have found a direct relationship between blood THC concentration and impaired driving ability.
Marijuana is the illicit drug most frequently found in the blood of drivers who have been
involved in vehicle crashes, including fatal ones. Two large European studies found that drivers
with THC in their blood were roughly twice as likely to be culpable for a fatal crash than drivers
who had not used drugs or alcohol.

6. Is marijuana addictive. Why not/yes?

Yes, Marijuana use are often associated with dependence in which a person feels withdrawal
symptoms when not taking the drug. People who use marijuana frequently often report
irritability, mood and sleep difficulties, decreased appetite, cravings, restlessness, and/or various
forms of physical discomfort that peak within the first week after quitting and last up to 2 weeks.
Marijuana dependence occurs when the brain adapts to large amounts of the drug by reducing
production of and sensitivity to its own endocannabinoid neurotransmitters.

7. List 5 acute effects of marijuana? Some are occasional or circumstantial.

Some of the acute adverse effects include hyperemesis syndrome, impaired coordination and
performance, anxiety, suicidal ideations/tendencies, and psychotic symptoms.

8. List and explain 3 chronic effects.

Neuronal Communication:
1. Nerve Impulse: THC mimics anandamide, this resemblance allows the drug to attach to
the endocannabinoid’s receptors.
2. The Binding: Anandamide attaches to the receptors in the different parts of the body the
controls; pleasure, emotions, pain, digestion, coordination, memory and posture.
3. THC disrupts neuronal communication like no other neurotransmitter causing chaos and
dead to abnormal messages being sent throughout the network.

9. Is marijuana a gate way drug? Why not/yes?

These findings are consistent with the idea of marijuana as a "gateway drug." However, most
people who use marijuana do not go on to use other, "harder" substances. Also, cross-
sensitization is not unique to marijuana. Alcohol and nicotine also prime the brain for a
heightened response to other drugs are, like marijuana, also typically used before a person
progresses to other, more harmful substances. It is important to note that other factors besides
biological mechanisms, such as a person’s social environment, are also critical in a person’s risk
for drug use. An alternative to the gateway-drug hypothesis is that people who are more
vulnerable to drug-taking are simply more likely to start with readily available substances such
as marijuana, tobacco, or alcohol, and their subsequent social interactions with others who use
drugs increases their chances of trying other drugs. Further research is needed to explore this
question.

10. Is possible that marijuana affects your school /academic achievement?

Research has shown that marijuana’s negative effects on attention, memory, and learning can last
for days or weeks after the acute effects of the drug wear off, depending on the person’s history
with the drug. Consequently, someone who smokes marijuana daily may be functioning at a
reduced intellectual level most or all the time.

11. Can marijuana affect the future baby in a pregnant woman?

More research is needed on how marijuana use during pregnancy could impact the health and
development of infants, given changing policies about access to marijuana, as well as significant
increases over the last decade in the number of pregnant women seeking substance use disorder
treatment for marijuana use.

12. Is marijuana abuse linked to mental disorders?

Several studies have linked marijuana use to increased risk for psychiatric disorders, including
psychosis (schizophrenia), depression, anxiety, and substance use disorders, but whether and to
what extent it causes these conditions is not always easy to determine. The amount of drug used,
the age at first use, and genetic vulnerability have all been shown to influence this relationship.
The strongest evidence to date concerns links between marijuana use and substance use disorders
and between marijuana use and psychiatric disorders in those with a preexisting genetic or other
vulnerability.

13. Can marijuana cure? What conditions have been proved marijuana to be effective? List 5
medical benefits of cannabis
The most common use for medical marijuana in the United States is for pain control. While
marijuana isn’t strong enough for severe pain (for example, post-surgical pain or a broken bone),
it is quite effective for the chronic pain that plagues millions of Americans, especially as they
age. Part of its allure is that it is clearly safer than opiates (it is impossible to overdose on and far
less addictive) and it can take the place of NSAIDs such as Advil or Aleve, if people can’t take
them due to problems with their kidneys or ulcers or GERD.

14. What percentage of the total population support marijuana for medicine. How many
states support legal medical marijuana? How many states for recreational?
About six-in-ten Americans (62%) say the use of marijuana should be legalized, reflecting a
steady increase over the past decade, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. The share
of U.S. adults who support marijuana legalization is little changed from about a year ago when
61% favored it but it is double what it was in 2000 (31%).

15. Why marijuana is still in schedule 1? What is schedule 1? Can you name 3 other drugs
classified as schedule 1? What schedule would you suggest for marijuana to be in? Why?
Schedule I drugs, substances, or chemicals are defined as drugs with no currently accepted
medical use and a high potential for abuse. Some examples of Schedule I drugs are: heroin,
lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine
(ecstasy), methaqualone, and peyote.

16. Who discovered the cannabinoids receptors for CBD and THC? How do they affect your
body?
After several decades of research, scientists studying the effects of marijuana made several
important discoveries. Not only did they identify the active ingredient in marijuana, they also
discovered where and how it works in the brain via a new system they called the
endocannabinoid (EC) system. The EC system named after the marijuana plant Cannabis sativa
and its active ingredient delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is a unique communications system
in the brain and body that affects many important functions, including how a person feels,
moves, and reacts.
17. Who was Harry J Anslinger? What did he do? Did he love marijuana?
Harry Jacob Anslinger was a United States government official who served as the first
commissioner of the U.S. Treasury Department's Federal Bureau of Narcotics. He was a
supporter of prohibition and the criminalization of drugs and played a pivotal role in cannabis
prohibition.

18. Who is to blame for marijuana being placed in schedule 1? What was the reason?
Almost since marijuana was first classified this way, advocates have been fighting to
“reschedule” it to a lower tier. They argue that the Schedule I classification isn’t justified on
scientific grounds. Marijuana is not considered highly addictive or dangerous except possibly for
adolescents who smoke it while their brains are still forming. And the plant seems to hold
medical promise in several areas one drug that is derived from a compound found in marijuana
has already been approved to treat nausea in cancer patients.

19. Who created the Medical Marijuana act of 2017? What is the purpose?
Among the early cultivators of cannabis for recreational use in California were Arabs,
Armenians, and Turks who grew cannabis as early as 1895 to make hashish for local
consumption. Unlike in other states where fears of black or Hispanic use of cannabis drove new
restrictions, California was an exception for its focus on South Asian immigrants. A California
delegate to the Hague Convention wrote in 1911: Within the last year we in California have been
getting a large influx of Hindus and they have in turn started quite a demand for cannabis Indica;
they are a very undesirable lot and the habit is growing in California very fast.

20. What has been the effect of the proliferation of marijuana dispensaries on opioid
overdoses.
The report the most detailed examination of medical marijuana and opioid deaths conducted to
date found that legalizing medical marijuana was associated with lower levels of opioid deaths
only in states that had provisions for dispensaries that made medical marijuana easily available to
patients. Opioid death rates were not lower in states that just provided legal protections to
patients and caregivers, allowing them to grow their own marijuana.

21. Can marijuana make me stupid?

Even if further research discloses no direct link between marijuana and IQ declines, the
researchers caution teens against using marijuana. “While marijuana use in adolescence may not
be causal of lower measured intelligence, this does not mean that heavy use in adolescence is
problem free,” says Dr. Isen. “There are real health risks associated with all drugs, including
marijuana.”

22. How neurons communicate under the influence of THC?

Cannabinoid receptors are concentrated in certain areas of the brain associated with pain,
thinking, memory, pleasure, coordination and time perception. THC attaches to these receptors
and activates them and affects a person's memory, pleasure, movements, thinking, concentration,
coordination, and sensory and time perception, according to NIDA. Also, is a very effective
analgesic.

23. How do marijuana work in the brain?

Drugs interfere with the way neurons send, receive, and process signals via neurotransmitters.
Some drugs, such as marijuana and heroin, can activate neurons because their chemical structure
mimics that of a natural neurotransmitter in the body. This allows the drugs to attach onto and
activate the neurons. Although these drugs mimic the brain's own chemicals, they don't activate
neurons in the same way as a natural neurotransmitter, and they lead to abnormal messages being
sent through the network.

24. Can marijuana affect the brain development of a teenager?

Yes, it can in the short term, marijuana use has been shown to impair functions such as attention,
memory, learning and decision-making. Those effects can last for days after the high wears off.
Heavy marijuana use in adolescence or early adulthood has been associated with a dismal set of
life outcomes including poor school performance, higher dropout rates, increased welfare
dependence, greater unemployment and lower life satisfaction.

25. Why Utah has a hard time adopting weed as a medicine?

The reason is because of the LDS church. In Utah the LDS church is a large impact that’s
carrying the image if drug free and free of usage.