A teenager in Colorado leaped to his death after consuming a marijuana cookie containing six times the recommended amount of the drug.

A study published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention focuses on the death of a 19-year-old man from Wyoming who consumed the cookie on a visit to Colorado, where recreational marijuana use was legalised in 2012, and recommends clearer labelling for edible recreational products containing the drug.

International Cannabinoid Research Society’s (or ICRS) recent 25th annual symposium proved to be a great place to share ideas and learn from a wide variety of highly accomplished scientists in the area of cannabinoid research. The 4-day conference was highly diverse, covering everything from novel chemical cannabinoid entities, to quality control methods for cannabis, to non-THC cannabinoids such as CBD (cannabidiol) and CBG (cannabigerol).

By Nora Volkow, Director, National Institute on Drug Abuse

On Thursday, Gallup released a poll showing that 44 percent of Americans have said they've tried marijuana, the largest number the survey has ever recorded. This isn't too far off from what other polls have found (this Pew Research Center poll pegged the number at 49 percent), and given that people are being asked to admit to behavior that is illegal in most places, the true number is almost certainly higher. So we're past the point where most American adults have tried pot, which helps explain why support for legalization has also become a majority position.

Sandra Bland was high on marijuana — while she was incarcerated in the Texas jail where she eventually died — according to Waller County District Attorney Elton Mathis. Mathis reportedly said in a text message to an attorney representing the Bland family that “[l]ooking at the autopsy results and toxicology, it appears she swallowed a large quantity of marijuana or smoked it in the jail.”

If true, this allegation suggests that security in this jail facility is extraordinarily lax. How does marijuana make its way to an incarcerated individual in the first place? And how does that individual manage to smoke or eat a “large quantity” of it without jail officials noticing?

While delivering a speech on Thursday, New Jersey Governor and presidential hopeful Chris Christie doubled-down on his anti-marijuana agenda. Referring to marijuana users as “diseased,” Gov. Christie reiterated his ambitions to “crack down and not permit” marijuana use, even in states where the practice is legal.

Senate Appropriations Committee Allows Marijuana Legalization to Move Forward in Nation's Capital

This month the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER,) an non-partisan think tank, published a working paper showing that states who allow patients to access medicinal marijuana through dispensaries have fewer rates of opioid addiction and overdose deaths.

The impact was measured by researchers who studied admissions for opioid pain reliever addiction and opioid overdose death.  The research was done by the RAND Corporation and the University of California, Irvine.

“If marijuana is used as a substitute for powerful and addictive pain relievers in medical marijuana states,”

The #1 Reason to Invest in Marijuana Stocks

After my grandfather died, my grandmother’s life was filled with anxiety and stress.

In fact, when he died, the woman I had known as Grandma died, too.

Not literally, of course, but spiritually and emotionally.

She was so overcome with anxiety that her health rapidly deteriorated.      

Make no mistake; few things will wreak havoc on your immune system like stress and anxiety.

Over time, she did concede to getting on anti-anxiety meds, and she regularly saw a psychologist. It helped, but the meds did come with a few side effects that also likely affected her health in a negative way.

When I first opened the D.C. office for Americans for Safe Access (ASA) in 2006, to bring representation of medical marijuana patients to our nation's capitol, I was told by many it was not worth the effort.  A quick skim of the political landscape back then showed we would be facing a steep slope. Sure, twelve states had passed medical marijuana laws and  80% of Americans supported medical cannabis access, but the federal government refused to admit that medical cannabis patients existed.  The talking points from federal agencies were always “there is no such thing as medical marijuana,” and most members of Congress were paralyzed by fears of backlash or were dug into to refer madness.