> From the article it sounds like this is strictly an issue of it not being legal and regulated.
This has nothing to do with regulation or prohibition. Remember fake pentium chips, capacitors, transistors and tons of other electronic components? The simple fact is popular things will be counterfeited and vape cartridges are easy to counterfeit. Counterfeiting is also a problem in legal states too. Unless you are going to a legit shop and spending real money you are most likely getting fake garbage.
When cannabis carts came around they were $75 here in NYC for a 1 gram and were tough to get. My first was a nice brass knuckles brand that hit like a mother fucker. Then there was a sudden flood and prices were dropping as low as $35 for a 1 gram and people were suspicious. Then it was even reported back then that counterfeiting was a big problem.
When CA legalized a second wave of cartridges came in and we got more brands and again, higher prices around 50-60 for 1 gram. but again, rumors of fakes followed and so called trusted brands like kingpen were vulnerable.
Me? I just smoke flower. Can't fake that. Though you can be sold low yield crap or laced stuff but honestly, I haven't heard of that crap in over two decades. Basically that's the kind of shit they pull on unsuspecting high school kids. The worst flower you get nowadays is generic mexican brick weed that smells like plastic wrap.
The same pesticides that end up in cartridges came from the flower/material that was used.
Flower can also have molds, bugs and other things that a good test would show and people who just "trust" flower would then smoke. Sticking to flower wont keep you safe from anything but vitamin-e in the lungs.
More than half the flower I see in NYC is in counterfeit CA/CO/OR/WA packaging, I do not trust its safety.
Testing is the solution... all intake methods have their inherent risks.
Concerning flower, about 15 years ago in the UK, there was an issue where flower was sprinkled with glass beads[1] to give it the appearance of having a lot of trichomes.
Legalization and regulation would solve this problem.
>More than half the flower I see in NYC is in counterfeit CA/CO/OR/WA packaging, I do not trust its safety
That's fine, your choice and all... But tens (hundreds?) of millions of people have been smoking weed in this country for decades. How many cases of illness due to pesticides have there been? I can recall a few, but it's a tiny, tiny number.
Right, and we don't even know what the cause is yet. I have been vaping for about nine years now. If you look through my comment history you'll what side of this issue I'm on.
The problem with pesticides isn't acute poisoning, but health effects from chronic exposure.
No one is going to go to end up in the ER after smoking a joint, but if one's sources are consistently tainted, there might be an increase risk for cancer or other diseases later on.
Myclobutanil will still produce hydrogen cyanide vapor in a joint, it will just be of less dosage. Risk of 'hotspots' exists: you are right that it is much less than for concentrates, but it is non-zero.
It heavily depends on the pesticide and how it's ingested. Some pesticides are fine in the human body and simply aren't metabolized well enough to cause any trouble, though others can be very aggressive on humans over long term exposure.
If you heat the pesticide up or even burn it, the resulting compounds can be unpredictable and range from even more harmless or actually toxic.
If you're buying pot off the street and it comes with a label; you're getting ripped off.
Seriously the stuff has been popular since the 1960's. I think we can all agree that smoking "pure" pot, mold bugs and all, isn't this massive health risk that everyone needs to watch out for. The oldest stoners seem to be just as happy and healthy as the younger ones, if not more so. And that's just by buying unlabelled, untested plants grown by friends.
Regularly inhaling burned plant material is harmful. Cannabis is not as dangerous as tobacco, but smoking is going to substantially increase your risk of lung disease and cancer.
So naturally the most American thing to do right now is to ban systems that give people the drug delivery without the harmful smoke. Black market providers will definitely be held to better safety standards and offer more honest labeling so adults can make informed choices about the risks they want to take with their own bodies.
(Of course when we're actually living in a bizarro world of moral panic where a third of Americans think that vaping is equally or more dangerous than smoking cigarettes, so it's hard to have too much faith in our public education.)
Of course when we're actually living in a bizarro world of moral panic [...]
Loading up a reasonable observation with tons of snark and broad political critique doesn't make for great conversation. I could just as easily point out that the technological innovation of vaping simply opens up a new market for unscrupulous capitalists to make a quick buck out of overselling the upside benefits while dumping the downside risks on the unwary.
Actually I thought it was the other way round. Just that you don't smoke as much cannabis as you do tobacco (i.e. a 20 a day every day without fail habit
My dealer isn't just any old schmuck off the street. He moves pounds weekly and always top quality. Fat moist sticky buds in Hermes jars. He weighs it out right in front of me. My other guy is difficult, amazing selection but I have to go through someone as that guy is super secretive.
Both are West Indian and weed is almost a religion to some of those guys. So they don't mess around with quality. They been smoking longer than I have. Full trust. You just have to know the right people to get solid connects.
I don't disagree with your points, but i would point out that better research in agri-science and more competitive markets has led to more issues in the supply chain. Are the heavy metals left from the nutes killing anyone? Not at the rate Vitamin E is, but do know they are harmful.
People put scent agents on flower(ive heard of pixie sticks being used to add "grape/berry" scent), as well as other chemicals to make it appear a certain way. These things were probably not happening in the 60. So we don't know the real long term dangers because these issues havent been around long enough.
oddly enough, some extraction methods can actually make moldy/unsafe material safe, or at least get it past testing and onto the market. SFE apparently kills mold and pests. so you are taking flower deemed unworthy of human consumption into oil that is now claimed to be of dubious safety...hmm.
there are actually companies that specialize in buying test failing lots of flower and extracting them.
1. In CA, all cannabis sold at the market must be tested by a lab for purity. This gives consumers quantifiable information on what they are putting into their bodies.
2. I am a big fan of tinctured Canibus. This is made by soaking cannabis flowers in high proof alcohol. This method helps kill many bacteria that could cause human harm. Fortunately, I live in a state where I can grow my own and know that my crop from growth through production is free of Hydrogen cyanide. Caterpillar poop has been a bit of an issue on a few of my plants this year though.
3. The issue here is a bad vape. Not cannabis in general.
Cannabis is much like a tomato plant from an ecological perspective. If you're going to sell cannabis at market regulate it like you do tomatoes. If you can grow your own next to your tomatoes. Unless your heavy user chances are the harvest from 1-2 cannabis plants will last you a full year or more assuming yields of 1/2 1 -lbs per plant.
You have this myopic view whereby you’re only considering the price. what is your health/life worth to you? Saving $30 a pop?
I’ll happily spend that $30 to know what’s going into my lungs.
First and foremost, lets get it regulated, _then_ let the market set its price. Sure there still may be counterfeits but at least discerning consumers will have a choice.
You point to other areas where regulation could be better enforced as a reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater here, that doesn’t jibe.
> First and foremost, lets get it regulated, _then_ let the market set its price. Sure there still may be counterfeits but at least discerning consumers will have a choice.
Governments can remain irrational longer than you can breathe.
I don’t have that kind of patience for someone else to get around to re-granting me Freedom.
Then you’re trading patience for the having your freedom-years statistically decreased. A fine decision for an independent actor but not the kind of thing strong societies are built on.
When cannabis carts came around they were $75 here in NYC for a 1 gram and were tough to get. My first was a nice brass knuckles brand that hit like a mother fucker. Then there was a sudden flood and prices were dropping as low as $35 for a 1 gram and people were suspicious. Then it was even reported back then that counterfeiting was a big problem.
When CA legalized a second wave of cartridges came in and we got more brands and again, higher prices around 50-60 for 1 gram. but again, rumors of fakes followed and so called trusted brands like kingpen were vulnerable.
Me? I just smoke flower. Can't fake that. Though you can be sold low yield crap or laced stuff but honestly, I haven't heard of that crap in over two decades. Basically that's the kind of shit they pull on unsuspecting high school kids. The worst flower you get nowadays is generic mexican brick weed that smells like plastic wrap.