New Study Suggests Medical Marijuana Reduces Suicide Rates

States that offer it have lower numbers

While lawmakers and politicians have been coming out in droves to endorse the legalization of medical and even recreational marijuana, the medical establishment hasn't been as supportive. But the tide could be turning: The American Journal of Public Health has just published a study suggesting that states that legalize medical marijuana can expect a reduction in suicide rates.

A team of economists looked at state-by-state statistics on suicide rates over a 17-year period, from 1990 to 2007, comparing data from states that voted to legalize medical marijuana with those that kept it criminalized. According to their calculations, in the three years following legalization, the suicide rate dropped, on average, 10.8 percent among men in their 20s and 9.8 percent for men in their 30s.

Comments

[datcv]

It's hard to be depressed when the music sounds so good and this bag of Doritos is the most delicious thing on earth.

[Firstname]

This is further evidence we are only at the very beginning of realizing the true medical/social/economic potentials for this valuable medicine. Cannabis as medicine has been intentionally kept secret by greed and ignorance for way too many years in our recent history.

[Waterfall67b]

Interesting but not really relevant to the prohibitionists' argument.

If a substance is taken by informed adults for non-medical or recreational purposes, the medical side effects are irrelevant.