“It is still more difficult to study cannabis than it is to study heroin.”

A Canadian doctor is calling out his peers for spreading misinformation about cannabis edibles.

In over a decade of work in the country’s emergency rooms, Dr. Ian Mitchell said he has treated more patients suffering from the effects of ingesting Tide Pods than from THC-infused treats. The cannabis cases that Dr. Mitchell has seen have involved potent products from the unregulated market.

“We see far more alcohol overdoses than we see cannabis overdoses, and they can be much more serious and certainly involve a lot more trauma,” he told Mugglehead.

Problems can certainly arise from ingesting too much THC, Dr. Mitchell said, pointing to patients who have arrived reporting symptoms of paranoia, nausea and dizziness, but the only treatment they really require is the passage of time.

“So, we just keep an eye on them and wait for the symptoms to wear off,” he said. “But there’s not really anything active to do.”

Dr. Mitchell, who is currently researching the therapeutic effects on marijuana on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at the University of British Columbia, takes umbrage with the work of some of his peers that he said offers a skewed view of the subject. He pointed to a popular article appearing in the Canadian Medical Association Journal warning of the dangers of edibles.

“The whole tone of the article was particularly negative,” he said. “But really what we’re seeing now is a movement from an unregulated source to a now-regulated source, which really should only improve safety and consumer confidence.”

The article, written by University of Toronto researchers Jasleen Grewal and Dr. Lawrence Loh, warns that black market edibles could be laced with more dangerous drugs, such as fentanyl, something that Dr. Mitchell said amounts to “fear-mongering.” He said there has not been a single confirmed case of this happening.

“That’s a myth that’s been propagated by a number of people such as (President Donald) Trump officials and the (former) Premier of British Columbia, Christy Clark,” he said.

In a response, Grewal and Dr. Loh said that while Dr. Mitchell is focusing on potential contamination, this does not diminish other risks, such as over consumption.

But Dr. Mitchell argued this argument has its basis in data from hospital visits in post-legalization Colorado, which had different regulations in place than the ones now used. “We’ve learned from Colorado’s experience, so I’m expecting to see relatively not as much of an increase in emergency room visits in Canada,” he said.

Ultimately, the only thing that will settle this debate is more research and education, but Dr. Mitchell said that is easier said than done. “The problem is that the science of cannabis in the last four decades has been prominently focused on the harms, so the literature supporting harms has been about 90 per cent and the literature supporting benefits has only been about 10 per cent,” he said.

“It is still more difficult to study cannabis than it is to study heroin.”

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