The Dangers of Laced Marijuana
When it comes to drugs, marijuana is among the most popular, and it is considered the most utilized substance in the world. This is because many countries today have labeled this plant legal, and it has a growing popularity among many people.
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As its popularity rises, so does the talk of laced marijuana. This is cannabis with other substances like meth, cocaine, PCP, and ecstasy.
What are the dangers of laced marijuana? The dangers of laced marijuana include overdose, aggression, breathing and heart issues, psychotic behavior, and most of all, addiction. This is why it is essential to know what you are dealing with before trying it out.
In this article, you will find more details about the dangers of laced marijuana and how common it might be in your location.
Understanding marijuana and laced drugs can give you an idea of the risks and how to deal with them in the future properly. Let’s get right to today’s post to improve your understanding of laced marijuana and more.
Marijuana and Laced Drugs
Marijuana can produce a variety of feelings, and different individuals can have different experiences. For most users, it produces only a relaxed feeling and some euphoria and laughter, increased sensory perception, changed time perception, and increased appetite.
However, it is not all about the good stuff, as some people experience paranoia, anxiety, fear, panic, or acute psychosis.
Lacing marijuana is a widespread practice for drugs like cocaine, which are often laced with other substances. This way, you bulk up the original product amount, and then you gain more profits from it.
Other drugs that can be sold by weight can also be laced with other substances to add weight or bulk them up. Some rare cases are laced with different substances to alter the drug’s psychoactive effects.
If you lace marijuana with other drugs, it will mainly alter its effect. It can be quite dangerous to combine marijuana with other substances and can produce alarming side effects.
Plus, if you obtain marijuana from an illicit source, you can’t be sure that marijuana does not contain other substances.
How Common Is Laced Marijuana?
It can be hard to say how common laced marijuana is because many users don’t really admit that they encountered it or are just not aware that it was laced. You will find out about it only if you end up in an emergency room from it.
It is believed that nationwide, about 5.6 percent of adults over the age of 26 have used marijuana in the past month. Among those who have used marijuana recently, only a tiny portion has likely encountered so-called laced marijuana.
Many authorities believe that, in the United States alone, there is an increase in users of fry, which is a type of marijuana-laced cigarette dipped in codeine-based cough syrup or embalming fluid mixed with PCP.
Laced weed is commonly reported when it has the potential to cause overdoses. Police have seized a stash of fentanyl-laced weed during a fentanyl-ring drug bust.
This kind of incident happens everywhere globally; fentanyl is a synthetic narcotic that can be highly addictive and easily cause an overdose. This operation is intended to warn recreational drug users, especially pot smokers, of the danger of buying weed from an unknown source where laced marijuana can show up on the streets.
Substances Marijuana Can Be Laced With
Marijuana is known to be potentially laced with other psychoactive drugs. As a result, it can produce varied psychoactive effects in its users.
People lace marijuana with other drugs to potentially generate more profit in the long run. Here are some of the most used and abused drugs and substances that are commonly added to marijuana:
Lead or Other Heavy Metals
There are reports that THC’s potency in most marijuana sold in the market today is too high. This is in comparison to the marijuana that was sold back in the 70s and 80s.
Also, there are attempts to draw more THC to make more potent marijuana edible products. This is done by adding harmful compounds like butane.
Moreover, some recent soil and substrate tests are being used to grow marijuana plants in legal states.
The findings showed that the plants draw in heavy metals from the soil where they are being grown. There are attempts to develop more potent THC cannabis products, but this also results in more significant amounts of heavy metals and pesticides ending up in cannabis products.
Glass
There are also reports of marijuana containing glass. This situation presents a grave danger for many individuals who enjoy edible marijuana or smoking joints.
If you want to know if there is glass in your marijuana, you can test it by rubbing some of the product on a CD. The glass will scratch and leave marks on the CD, while unaltered marijuana won’t be able to scratch it.
Fungus and Bacteria
Some articles published online indicate that, in many cases, even legal marijuana marketed in Colorado has high counts of fungi and bacteria. This is another health hazard. It is why a newer and safer standard is needed regarding the content of cannabis products.
These substances may not result from people intentionally lacing the drug, but they indicate that the standards for storing, growing, and marketing cannabis products remain poorly defined.
PCP
Phencyclidine or phenyl cyclohexyl piperidine (PCP) is mostly known as angel dust. It is a drug used for its mind-altering effects. PCP is a dangerous dissociative hallucinogenic drug, and it is commonly added to marijuana to produce a stronger and more varied psychoactive effect.
When it comes to different reports and news stories, plenty of lacing has occurred in situations where individuals were not aware that their cannabis was altered.
However, most cases appear to be individuals illicitly selling this combination without attempting to hide the fact that marijuana is laced.
Marijuana that is laced with PCP is mostly sold under different names, including dusted weed, fry, superweed, and wet weed, to name just a few.
There are several potentially harmful effects when you have laced marijuana with PCP. These include significant issues like hallucinations, delusions, confusion, aggression, suicidal thoughts, seizures, respiratory problems, and serious neurological conditions.
Heroin
Marijuana can be interlaced with heroin. Individuals smoking this kind of substance can become lethargic, relaxed, and develop severe symptoms.
These symptoms include reduced breathing rates, reduced heart rate, and sometimes confusion. They can also experience unconsciousness. Because heroin is a potentially dangerous drug, it can be fatal.
This shows that people who do not use the drug regularly have a significantly lower tolerance than those who regularly use it. This can increase the potential for overdose, as well as give you more severe issues.
Cocaine
Marijuana laced with cocaine is common, including the crack form of cocaine. They are usually laced together to produce a unique set of psychoactive effects, which consists of the stimulant effect of cocaine being more of a sedative form of marijuana.
Many people lace the drug themselves for personal use because marijuana is not commonly sold with laced cocaine.
However, some scattered reports have already occurred, and many people smoking marijuana are unaware that it is laced with cocaine. As a result, it produces several adverse effects on the body.
Also, cocaine is a potentially dangerous drug that, taken on its own, can lead to some harmful physical and psychological effects in individuals who use it more often.
This includes the development of hallucinations, paranoia, seizures, and cardiovascular issues.
LSD
LSD is a known hallucinogenic drug that can produce very potent effects even in a small dose. If you happen to take marijuana laced with LSD through smoking, it won’t give you any serious effect because the heat will destroy the LSD.
However, sometimes individuals dab the end of the marijuana cigarette where they place LSD on their lips. This can result in the substance being assimilated into one’s system and the development of different hallucinogenic effects.
You should know and properly understand that LSD is an extremely potent substance and can produce hallucinogenic effects that can last for 12 hours in only a little amount.
LSD might not be considered to have significant physical consequences. Some reports say that individuals unaware that they are taking LSD are at risk for severe and emotionally upsetting bad trips.
Methamphetamine
There have been instances in which marijuana was laced with a potent stimulant called methamphetamine, commonly known as crystal meth.
It can produce a potent effect that includes hallucinations, confusion, delusions, and sometimes seizures.
Embalming Fluid
Multiple reports state that marijuana has been laced with formaldehyde, commonly known as embalming fluid. This is an effort to produce an even more psychoactive effect and make marijuana more potent than it already is.
There are serious implications, as this can affect people’s cognitive perception, such as memory loss, because of the neurological damage and potentially fatal effects.
The Dangers of Laced Marijuana
There are plenty of dangers of laced marijuana, and you might not be aware of it. Many reports worldwide demonstrate a growing concern over laced marijuana.
It might be uncommon, and it will vary depending on the location and geography, but the dangers and numbers are real. Here are among the most common dangers of laced marijuana:
Overdose
As mentioned above, the fentanyl-laced marijuana bust showed the increasing danger of unwitting overdoses from recreational drug use. You might smoke marijuana only once or twice a year, but the wrong joint could send you to the emergency room or, in the worst case, the morgue.
It depends on the drug that is laced with marijuana. The bad news is, you won’t be able to tell just by looking at laced marijuana, so you can very easily overdose without knowing it.
Aggression
Marijuana laced with PCP can cause you to engage in psychotic and hazardous behavior. Some people even commit violent crimes while under the influence of PCP. If you add marijuana’s hallucinogenic effects to the mix, you will end up with a volatile cocktail of elements inside your body.
A lot of users don’t even remember what they did after smoking PCP-laced marijuana. It also creates the opposite effect of what weed should be doing to your body. You just ended up becoming violent and unmanageable.
Breathing and Heart Problems
PCP and some other drugs used to lace your marijuana can cause changes in your heart rate and breathe in general.
It can cause a rapid heartbeat, and it will elevate your blood pressure. As a result, it can damage your heart and lungs if you continue to do it regularly.
Psychotic Behavior
As a result of being high from all the laced marijuana you have been taking, psychotic symptoms can be a bizarre occurrence. They can even last longer than usual. This can result in a diagnosis with multiple mental disorders like schizophrenia or other mental illnesses when you don’t really have them.
Addiction
Let’s admit that marijuana by itself can be addictive; this is, even more, the case if it is laced with other drugs or substances. The weed being sold today is far stronger than that smoked by your parents or grandparents.
The reason is that a lot of growers are selectively breeding marijuana to increase the amount of THC. Then you add to that a potent cocktail or other highly addictive drugs like meth, cocaine, or even heroin.
Thus, your laced weed is even more addictive compared to the regular one.
The Signs and Symptoms of Laced Marijuana
Smoking laced weed can have different symptoms compared to plain marijuana. There are multiple reports from users who knew they had smoked something other than marijuana within 15 to 20 minutes.
This is because the sensation is somehow different depending on the drug or substance laced with marijuana.
PCP-Laced Marijuana
If you happen to have marijuana laced with PCP, it can cause you to have a wide range of symptoms like hallucinations, impaired coordination, slurred speech, aggressiveness, disorientation, paranoia, and seizures. Worst-case scenario, you can fall into a coma and die if you smoke too much.
Fentanyl-Laced Marijuana
This kind of laced marijuana is severely dangerous because it enters your brain faster than any typical medical applications. Clammy skin slowed heartbeat, seizure, and severe drowsiness are the most common signs of a fentanyl overdose.
If you suspect that someone has accidentally smoked fentanyl-laced marijuana, get them to a hospital nearby, as fentanyl can stop your heart and other brain functions.
Codeine-Laced Cough Syrup
This is actually a specific and intentionally laced type of marijuana that is mostly known as fry. Dealers take a blunt and dip it into a codeine-laced cough syrup, or sometimes they use embalming fluid mixed with PCP.
With this kind of lacing and additional drugs, many users say that it tastes and smells terrible, resulting in a potent high.
Many users of this kind of laced marijuana use the drug in groups because it can result in violence, paranoia, panic, and occasional loss of consciousness.
When it comes to signs and symptoms of laced marijuana, it is important always to call 911 if someone has a seizure or passes out.
An overdose of laced marijuana can be fatal, which can happen if someone has taken a drug they are not accustomed to taking. They can also experience breathing issues, trouble waking up, and seizures because the brain has been affected.
Conclusion
Using multiple drugs is never a good thing, as it can be hazardous to one’s health. It can even become fatal if the user is unaware of some of the drugs infused with their normal weed. Using multiple drugs and weed can also make diagnosis and treatments for people suffering from mental health a complicated thing.
If you happen to be struggling with marijuana use, you should contact your health care professional. Doctors can diagnose if you are suffering from one or multiple substance use disorders.