Is Cannabis a Drug?
What defines a drug and how cannabis fits into that paradigm.
“In pharmacology, a drug is a chemical? substance, typically of known structure, which, when administered to a living organism, produces a biological effect. A pharmaceutical drug also called a medication or medicine, is a chemical substance used to treat, cure, prevent, or diagnose a disease or to promote well-being.”
-Wikipedia
For the past several years, I’ve contemplated how cannabis has been labeled as a recreational drug and therapeutic medicine. It’s a binary classification that has, admittedly, puzzled me for quite a bit. As a society, we tend to bifurcate these drugs into either “the good kind” or “the bad kind”. Good drugs are generally described as having therapeutic value. Bad drugs are considered to have a high potential for harm with no therapeutic value. Very rarely do we accept using “bad drugs”, and we never call it recreational drug use. We label it as a vice. Some researchers, like Dr. Carl Hart and Hamilton Morris, are trying to dispel that separation altogether—but for our purposes, we are going to stick with these labels for simplicity.
Typically, we define recreational drug use as an unacceptable vice, thus why it’s illegal in most states. Whether or not they should be criminalized is another matter. Common street drugs like heroin, fentanyl, or crack cocaine have had devastating effects on personal lives and our communities. As overdose deaths continue to increase, more people are hesitant to embrace the concept of drug use as a tolerable recreation.
Using alcohol and tobacco, according to the definitions listed above, classifies as recreational drug use. But given the very negative stereotypes and consequences of the more general associations, it’s far more palatable to refer to these activities as vices. The important distinction is that it is the activity that is the vice and not the substance itself. Governments place excise taxes or a “sin tax” on these activities to discourage their use.
As most of us know, alcohol and cigarettes are derived from plants. We don’t label the plants themselves as vice since it’s a thing and not a behavior. Only when ingested by humans for non-therapeutic reasons do we label the activity as a vice. And that’s an important distinction. For something to be a drug, it has to be procured and ingested by people. Tobacco, Alcohol, and even cannabis have to go through a curing or fermentation process for their biological effects to be induced. Currently, the FDA and ATF regulate alcohol and tobacco with neither organization disallowing home grows.
We accept the drinking of alcohol and smoking of tobacco for mainly cultural and ancestral reasons. Humans are unlikely to suddenly stop engaging in these practices, but we are seeing interesting trends develop. As of 2021, 60% of Americans drink alcohol, declining from 65% back in 2019. Cigarette smoking is at an all-time low with 30 million people (11%) continuing to light up. Is this for health related reasons or culture specific? It’s too early to tell, but it does appear to be in line with the growing health and wellness movement.
The other type of acceptable drug use (and far more prevalent) is for therapeutic purposes. 9 out of 10, or 260 million Americans take over-the-counter medications regularly. 66% of Americans are taking daily prescriptions. Those numbers are mind-boggling!
That leaves us with this question— where does cannabis fit in the drug paradigm?
To answer this question, we turn to consumer behaviors and reasons for use. Only 16% of consumers say they use cannabis for recreational purposes (i.e. as a vice). The other 84% report doing so to improve quality of life through better sleep, less stress, less pain, etc. Are the 16% nothing more than hedonistic heathens and the rest are disabled patients? Hardly. Imagine using alcohol or cigarettes to treat minor health conditions. That’s ludicrous. But the same cannot be said for cannabis. Therefore, if cannabis does not fit into this binary classification system, where does it fit?
From a regulatory perspective, the optimal scenario is to treat it like a tomato and have its cultivation regulated by the USDA and its distribution regulated by the FDA (finished products similar to alcohol). These terms are outlined in South Carolina House Rep. Nancy Mace’s States Reform Act. She commanded an impressive re-election victory in a swing district which gives her more sway with the GOP. However, without a Republican president championing the issue, Mace will face difficult challenges convincing GOP leaders like Mitch McConnell to go along.