Dr. Keith Humphreys

So decriminalization is about the user, and that's to say, look, we're not going to punish you for using pot, okay?

And that is a pretty popular – it's been a popular policy for a long time and doesn't –

seem to really affect use that much, you know, maybe a little bit, but not a lot.

Legalization is making the production, processing, marketing and sale legal, bringing in a corporation.

And that is fundamentally different, you know, because the corporation is going to have very smart people who are good at selling and they will increase, you know,

consumption of the product.

At this point, you know, I don't know the exact state count, but it's most people in the United States, population-wise, have access at this point to a recreational cannabis and virtually every state, I believe, has something.

If it's not recreational, it's medical or there were these, due to hemp, there was sort of a way, mistake they made in regulation, there's a way to process hemp that you can make these like delta-8s and delta-9s, so even

in states that are prohibited, there's quite a bit of hemp laced beverages, which are quite strong.

Is cannabis a gateway drug?

We were told that when we were in school.

Yeah, so all drugs are gateway drugs.

The lie in that was that cannabis had some unique role

that was going to lead you to use heroin use.

But the truth is anything, like if you're a teenager and you start smoking or you start drinking or you start using cannabis or stealing prescription opioids from your parents or whatever, that will increase your likelihood of progressing to other substances.

for multiple reasons.

One, you might like it, say, okay, well, I guess I'm kind of a drug, let me try some others.

Two, your social networks may change, so you're around other people who do this, and so you're comfortable with them, they're comfortable with you, and they're also more likely to have something else you might want to try.

And then the third thing is it could be some brain sensitization going on that makes drugs more rewarding.

And there is some interesting work with like identical twins in different states which seem to suggest that you could be starting some unfolding process when you expose a young brain to it.