Cannabis and schizophrenia

The link between cannabis and schizophrenia confirms once again. Cannabis use increases greatly the risk of becoming schizophrenic.

Cannabis is not a soft drug

It is not the first study showing an increased risk of schizophrenia among cannabis consumers.

But with a more significant decline, this risk proves to be higher than that had been believed. Moreover, knowing that cannabis is more toxic than tobacco, due to more intense inhalation of the smoker and the highest concentration of toxic substances, this supposedly "soft" drug is much less harmless as it seems.
Nowadays, cannabis is the illicit drug most used among young people, prevention must not loosen. And it goes through the opening dialogue in particular between parents and children, and as soon as possible, before that the teens are confronted.

Cannabis facilitates the toggle to schizophrenia

It still cannot assert that cannabis causes schizophrenia. On the other hand, it precipitates the fragile subjects to this mental illness.

During an analysis, whose results were published in the famous "Lancet" in 2007, more than 30 studies have been reviewed. The risk of developing schizophrenia disorders was increased by 40% in young smokers of seals compared with those who had never smoked.

But this risk rises proportionately with the intensity of the consumption. As well, the regular smokers (more than 100 seals per year, or approximately more than 2 per week) increases from 50 to 200% their risk to suffer from mental disorders (psychotic symptoms, hallucinations, anomalies of thought).

Other studies have confirmed this link since. Moreover, in Psychiatry Research in January 2014, an epidemiological study showing that the use of cannabis among young people has been associated with an earlier onset of the first signs of schizophrenia.

Cannabis is also associated with disturbance of memory, attention, original motivation, school failure and isolation. And finally, the tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is an active principle which can generate intense anxieties. In other words, it is the chemical responsible for most of drugs' psychological effects. THC changes behavior and in activity.

The fragility of teenagers justified prevention campaigns

It must be said that the brain of an adolescent continues actively to develop and therefore proves to be more vulnerable to any toxic substance. This single argument tend to justify all the prevention campaigns.

Yet, at 17 years, four of ten young people report having already made use. Between 15 and 30 years, 13 per cent of women and 25 per cent of men report having used cannabis in the past twelve months. And 3 per cent of young people are using cannabis on a daily basis
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