What is the fact? Say that again.
Evidence of meeting #27 for Health in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was effects.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #27 for Health in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was effects.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
The fact is that—
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
—polling of Canadians shows that those who use cannabis have higher income and higher education levels than non-cannabis users.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
That's because you can't poll street people, people who are addicted that we've heard about.
Anyway, there was a comment about psychiatric disorders. You really surprised me with that one; that's a wild claim.
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
It's the Canadian addiction survey. I welcome you all to please look it up.
9:30 a.m.
NDP
The Vice-Chair NDP Libby Davies
Maybe you'd like to provide the committee with the report, if you can put your hands on it.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
Mr. Lucas, you said that people can't die from marijuana use.
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
That's right. We were talking—
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
Bear with me. We heard from experts that marijuana users have twice the chance of being in a vehicle accident, and we know people die from vehicle accidents. We've also heard that marijuana can cause depression, as I mentioned, and that marijuana is linked to various cancers, including possibly lung cancer. A lot of people die from lung cancer. We heard from the experts that there are more chemicals in marijuana than in cigarettes. No one has ever done a double-blind study to prove whether it's true or not, but there are links between marijuana and lung cancer and other cancers. How can you claim that no one has ever died from marijuana use?
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
No one has, and the biggest research project looking at the link between cancer and upper-respiratory-airway cancer and cannabis was done by a researcher named Donald Tashkin. It was funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse in the U.S., and it found not only no link between cannabis use and upper-respiratory or lung cancer, but also that those who used cannabis moderately had a lesser chance of having upper-respiratory lung cancer than non-cannabis users, which is quite remarkable.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
Did you know by a clinical standard of proof, no one has ever proven that cigarettes cause lung cancer? It's done by epidemiological studies over decades, so there's probably no way to prove by a clinical standard that marijuana causes lung cancer or other cancers.
It's going to have to be done over decades. So what happens to all the people who are smoking marijuana now, when they find out later, as we found out with asbestos and tobacco, that it leads to cancers later in life?
I want to ask you about one other study, although I don't have the name of it. It's a study in the U.S. on criminals in prison for a whole range of crimes, including violent crimes. They found that I think 40% of them were smoking marijuana when they committed their crimes. Are you familiar with that study?
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
No, I'm not familiar with any study of that, and I would question whether they found cannabinoids in their system, which means they might have used cannabis in the last 30 days—it's one of the most detectable drugs in our system—or whether they were high on cannabis. Clearly the most criminogenic drug of all that we use in North America is alcohol. It's tied to the highest level of—
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
So alcohol is bad, and marijuana is less bad. Is that your position?
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
No, it's just that alcohol is directly linked to violent crime, to risky behaviour—
9:30 a.m.
Doctoral Candidate, University of Victoria, As an Individual
But cannabis does not. In fact, quite the opposite—
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
Terence Young Conservative Oakville, ON
No one denies the harms or risks of alcohol, Mr. Lucas. You're trying to deny the harms and risks of marijuana.
9:30 a.m.
NDP
The Vice-Chair NDP Libby Davies
Mr. Young, we're way over your time. I've been quite lenient with the time today because we only have the two witnesses, but we're way over now.
I'd like to welcome Ms. Jones to the committee. I realize that you haven't heard the testimony, so you could ask questions now or we could wait a bit and come back to you if you feel you need to get up to speed.
May 13th, 2014 / 9:35 a.m.
Liberal
9:35 a.m.
NDP
The Vice-Chair NDP Libby Davies
Yes, I realize that.
Thank you very much for coming, and we'll come back to you when you feel that you're up to speed with what's going on.
9:35 a.m.
NDP
The Vice-Chair NDP Libby Davies
Our next questioner will be Mr. Gravelle, for five minutes.
We're in our five-minute round, but again, we're being a bit lenient today because we have just the two witnesses.
Mr. Gravelle.
