A key question in the ongoing policy debate over cannabis' legal status is whether liberalizing cannabis laws leads to an increase in cannabis use. This paper provides new evidence on the impact of a specific type of liberalization, decriminalization, on initiation into cannabis use. Our identification strategy exploits variation in the timing of cannabis policy reforms and our estimation frame...

Introduction This paper discusses the case for decriminalization of cannabis use, based on a careful weighting of the currently available evidence regarding advantages and risks of such a policy change. The issue of decriminalization is a response to the widespread use of cannabis in spite of its current illegal status; that is, as a consequence of the perceived ineffectiveness of the tradition...

This paper uses the 2001 wave of National Drug Strategy Household Survey (NDSHS) to assess the impact of marijuana decriminalization policy on marijuana smoking prevalence in Australia. Both parametric and non-parametric methods are used. The parametric approach postulates an endogenous probit switching model and its nested binary probit, endogenous bivariate probit and two-part models to estim...

OBJECTIVES We tested the premise that punishment for cannabis use deters use and thereby benefits public health. METHODS We compared representative samples of experienced cannabis users in similar cities with opposing cannabis policies-Amsterdam, the Netherlands (decriminalization), and San Francisco, Calif (criminalization). We compared age at onset, regular and maximum use, frequency and qu...

There is a need for creative, public health-oriented solutions to the increasingly intractable problems associated with the North American opioid epidemic. This epidemic is a fundamentally continental problem, as routes of migration, drug demand, and drug exchange link the USA with Mexico and Canada. The challenges faced throughout North America include entrenched prescribing practices of opioi...

This technical report provides historical perspectives and comparisons of various approaches to the legal status of marijuana to aid in forming public policy. Information on the impact that decriminalization and legalization of marijuana could have on adolescents, in addition to concerns surrounding medicinal use of marijuana, are also addressed in this report. Recommendations are included in t...

BACKGROUND This study is an empirical assessment of the impact of the drug decriminalization policy followed by Portugal in July 2001, on the price of illicit drugs. METHODS The analysis is performed using a difference-in-differences approach and the Synthetic Control Method in order to construct a synthetic control unit from a convex combination of countries. RESULTS The results suggest th...

BACKGROUND As the "war on drugs" enters the latter half of its third decade since being forged into the American lexicon by President Ronald Reagan, the public has grown more skeptical of the current strategy and has proven to be receptive to a broader consideration of alternatives to incarceration. This has been the case most notably with marijuana offenses, where the policy discussion has shi...

Canada and the United States have recently evaluated decriminalization of drugs as multiple provinces states put motions forward to consider drug legislation. The influence factors such demographics, substance use, perceived use risk, personality not been widely studied in predicting attitudes toward decriminalization. A total 504 participants were drawn from university ( n = 269, 53.37%) commu...