The legalization of marijuana has several impacts in Colorado and other parts of the United States

The legalization of marijuana has several impacts in Colorado and other parts of the United States

The legalization of marijuana has several impacts in Colorado and other parts of the United States. The number of people arrested due to possession of the drug has declined, most people have adapted to using the drug within the specifications and requirements of the government despite the step to legalize the drug having positive impacts, and it also has negative consequences. This literature review provides a summary of findings and other related information of events since the legalization of the drug. Previously marijuana was considered to be an illegal drug which its use was prohibited fully.

The literature review and other information represented below are gathered in several ways. The first source of literature for review comes from web reports, spreadsheets data and briefing information. The second source of information is generated from an analysis of personal information available concerning the subject.

According to the CSA the drug marijuana is clustered under schedule one and is presumed to be dangerous through the state legislature has legalized its medical application and usage. District of Columbia and other twenty-three other states had accepted medicinal use of marijuana by December 2015. The acceptance and legalization of medicinal marijuana have increased over the past twenty years with states such as Colorado accepting its use (Monte, Zane, and Heard 2015.p241-242). In Colorado the marijuana law has undergone through five periods which includes pre-2000, between 2000 to 2009, commercialization of medical marijuana between 2010 to 2012, drug use for recreational purposes without medical values in 2013, recreational use and commercialization between 2014 to present. In the period prior to 2000, it was considered to be illegal to plant or possess marijuana. In the period between 2000 to 2009, it was legalized and identification cards were issued to those who are allowed to use the drug through doctor’s recommendation and prescription (Sokoya, et al 2018. p780-783). In the period between 2010 to 2012, there was the commercialization of medical marijuana which was regulated through licensed distributors, producers, and other stakeholders. In 2013 the sixty-fourth amendment came into action which supported growing for personal consumption and limits of recreational purposes but with no commercialization. From 2014 to present the recreational usage plus medical consumption of marijuana is both regulated by the law and commercialized.

Public safety

The overall number of individuals who were being arrested due to marijuana possession decreased by forty-six percent which approximate value of 12,894 going down to 7,004. In the state of Colorado arrest from the possession of cannabis or marijuana tops the list and after implementation of the new legislation, the number was able to go down by negative 47 percent  (Wang, Heard, and Roosevelt, 2017.p50). Also, the arrests which are associated with the selling of marijuana also declined by twenty-four percent while arrests associated with the producing of marijuana did not indicate substantial evidence with a difference of negative two percent.

Considering the general review of police arrests in Colorado, marijuana contributed to 6 percent of overall arrests made in 2012 and by the year 2013, the figure had decreased to 3 percent. Considering various races that live in Colorado the number of arrests among the white people was 51 percent, Hispanics 33 percent and black-Americans 25 percent. El Paso County had a 30 percent decrease in arrests and Adams County indicated 63 percent decrease  (Wang, et al 2018.p120).Considering the judicial system the court’s fillings of marijuana associated cases was able to decline by eighty-one percent from 2012 to 2015 with respective numbers of 10,340 down to 1954. Cases of felonies also decreased by 45 percent from 1023 down to 566 and other petty offenses decreased by 89 percent from 8728 down to 979 with marijuana possession case fillings declining by 88 percent. 69 percent of the cases were against juveniles between the ages of 10 years to 17 years; 78 percent were young adults between the age of eighteen and twenty years old and eighty-six percent were adults above twenty-one years old.

In reference to organized crime, that occurred within Colorado from 2012 to 2015 there was eighty-eight cases that were connected to marijuana where fifty-six cases were associated with distribution, sixteen were conspiracy cases, ten were production cases and six were a possession for reselling. According to the traffic safety department, the analysis of their reports indicated that there was a decline of 1 percent for cases where individuals break the rule and found under the influence.

Public health

The national survey current research survey indicates that the rate of prevalence for exposure to marijuana in the last month shows significant increment in youths from 21 percent before legalization to 31 percent after legalization. Current research reports indicate that usage among adults has increased from five percent in the year 2006 to 12 percent by 2014. The Colorado BRFSS and CDPHE research surveys indicate that fourteen percent of adults have admitted using marijuana in the past thirty days and thirty-three percent of individuals who were presently using on a daily basis. The department of public health in Colorado conducted analysis on hospital data such as diagnosis reports, billing codes and risk of exposure where results indicated that there was an increase from 803 to 2413 after the legalization of marijuana  (Davis, et al 2016. p373-379). The rate of individuals who were using marijuana visits the retailer’s increases from 739 up to 956 per hundred thousand visits. However, the number of visits to emergency distribution centers has been constantly increasing over the past years. The number of emergency calls has increased from 44 to 227 by the year 2015.

Youth impacts

Information about marijuana use among youths is obtained in two sources which are healthy children Colorado survey and a national survey on drug use plus health. The analysis of data from the KKCS shows that there is a slight decrease in the use of marijuana for the past 30 days in youths while on the other hand analysis from the NSDUH indicates a gradual increment in consumption over a period of time (Wang, Heard, and Roosevelt, 2017.p50). In the year 2013, according to HKCS findings, 80 percent of students in high school had not used marijuana in the previous thirty days. The HKCS report indicated that consumption of marijuana among youths gradually increases according to the grade level and on the other hand the NSDUH report analysis indicated that marijuana use among youths in Colorado is beyond the national calculated average. The review of results from the two reports indicates that health threats of marijuana are decreasing among Colorado youths  (Hopfer 2016.p15). The juvenile arrests associated with marijuana have increased by 5 percent and the rate of juvenile arrests which are associated with the drug also has increased by 2 percent. The white juvenile arrests have declined from 2198 in the year 2012 to 2016 by 2014 which represents an 8 percent decline. The Hispanic juvenile who was arrested due to marijuana has gone up from 778 to 1006 considering the same time frame and the results project 29 percent increase. The African-Americans arrests of juveniles in marijuana-related cases increased from 205 to 324 considering the same time frame which indicates 58 percent increase. According to the analysis of drug tests data there is an increase in the percentage of youths between ages of 10 to 14 that test positive for THC, the figure increased from 19 percent to 23 percent in the year 2014. The increases on youths between the ages of 15 to 17 years decreased by 1 percent (Blake and Finlaw 2014. p359). The information from the education department indicated that the rate of student’s suspension from drug-related causes increased from 391 to 506 per hundred thousand students who are registered. Considering the period 2014 to 2015 discipline cases associated with drugs contributed to 41 percent of all expulsion, 31 percent of referrals by law enforcement and 6 percent of all suspension cases in Colorado education institutions.

The Colorado department for education usually provides discipline data about various schools located within the state. Since marijuana was legalized in the state this department has been recording data related to the subject separately. The data collected are rated in terms of hundred thousand where numbers increases considering the number 818443 in 2009 and 889,006 by the end of 2015 (Blake and Finlaw 2014. p359). The drug suspension and expulsion related cases have been increasing drastically wherein 2009 the rate was 29 percent and the expulsion rate has also increased to 39 percent. The rate of law enforcement referrals associated with drug-related aspects was initially having increment rate of 13 percent but there has been gradual by up to 51 percent.

Legalization of marijuana has various consequences and endangering of children is one of them. According to the CHS conducted in 2014, indicated that parents which children between ages of 1 to 14, four percent of them had used marijuana in the last thirty days and considering method of consumption 76 percent were smokers, 39 percent consumed the drug through vaping while 14 percent ate it as food  (Wang, Heard, and Roosevelt, 2017.p50). Considering parent with children in the age bracket indicated above 7 percent had marijuana product available in their house. 92 percent of them insisted they kept the drug out of their children’s reach, 89 percent of the parents stored their product in the childproof container while 71 percent kept their drug in a locked container.

The marijuana enforcement division is responsible for the provision of license and regulation of its application in the medical practice. This division is mandated to generate regulations, implement legislation, and execute background analysis and issuance of business permits in order to implement a regulatory structure that is robust. From a financial perspective, the revenue which has been generated from tax, fees, levies, and licenses have increased by 77 percent from 76,152,468 dollars up to 135,100,465 dollars  (Wang, Hoyte, Roosevelt, and Heard 2019. p0009922818805206). The increase in revenue was majorly influenced by sales and other business activities related to marijuana. The large portion of the revenues generated came from the selling of marijuana. The money collected from the marijuana tax was used to build schools which sums to approximately 40 million dollars. The trend of medical marijuana cardholders has been increasing since 2009 after the drug was commercialized. By 2015, the number of register individuals who were holding cards was 109,922 in Colorado with average overall age of 42.5 and male cardholders were 65 percent while the remaining were female card holders (Reed 2016 p.130-200).  51 percent of the cardholders were above forty years old. The individuals in the old age use medical marijuana for various purposes where 93 percent of users have severe pain, 20 percent have muscle spasms and 12 percent of medical users have strong nausea.

Challenges

The most prevailing challenge is that data collection is subject to unmeasured alterations in human behavior associated with marijuana. The decrease in social stigma related to marijuana will result in more individuals willing to provide current information and participate in various surveys (Wang, et al 2018. p367). Legalization of marijuana has resulted in increased usage and this is confirmed with analysis of reports from emergency departments and hospitals. More individuals are willing to discuss their marijuana consumption information since it was legalized. Legalization of the drug has resulted in changes in various strategies being used by law enforcers to handle marijuana associated cases. The other challenges include restrictions in accessing data associated with the subject, lag time between when information was gathered and when it was available for access.

The marijuana legalization in Colorado has undergone a transformation in five stages with each of them having its set of rules and regulations. There have been negative and positive consequences since its legislation which has affected the state either way or the other. The trends of crime rates, marijuana consumption, and other aspects have also changed over a period of time. The content above provides findings from a literature review of research studies associated with the subject.

Work Cited

Monte, A.A., Zane, R.D. and Heard, K.J., 2015. The implications of marijuana legalization in Colorado. Jama, 313(3), pp.241-242.

Wang, G.S., Davies, S.D., Halmo, L.S., Sass, A., and Mistry, R.D., 2018. Impact of marijuana legalization in Colorado on adolescent emergency and urgent care visits. Journal of Adolescent Health.

Davis, J.M., Mendelson, B., Berkes, J.J., Suleta, K., Corsi, K.F. and Booth, R.E., 2016. Public health effects of medical marijuana legalization in Colorado. American journal of preventive medicine, 50(3), pp.373-379.

Hopfer, C., 2016, December. Marijuana Legalization in Colorado: Impact on Adolescents. In NEUROPSYCHOPHARMACOLOGY (Vol. 41, pp. S15-S15). MACMILLAN BUILDING, 4 CRINAN ST, LONDON N1 9XW, ENGLAND: NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP.

Blake, D. and Finlaw, J., 2014. Marijuana legalization in Colorado: Learned lessons. Harv. L. & Poly Rev., 8, p.359.

Wang, G.S., Heard, K. and Roosevelt, G., 2017. The Unintended Consequences of Marijuana Legalization.