Kid-friendly marijuana strains

According to the Huffington Post:

Owners of brands geared toward children of all ages are battling to keep notable names like Thin Mint, Tootsie Roll and Cinnamon Toast Crunch off the flavored nicotine used in electronic cigarettes.

Now the owners of those trademarks are fighting back to make sure their brands aren't being used to sell an addictive drug or make it appealing to to children.

"Using the Thin Mint name — which is synonymous with Girl Scouts and everything we do to enrich the lives of girls — to market e-cigarettes to youth is deceitful and shameless," Girl Scouts spokeswoman Kelly Parisi said in a statement.

The recent attention e-cigarettes have gained can be used to inform the emerging marijuana market.  For instance, the name “Thin Mint” is also used for a strain of marijuana that apparently tastes similar to the Girl Scout cookies.  Below is a medical marijuana ad that not only promotes Thin Mint marijuana but uses a cartoon character and offers a "free Capn Cosmics medible for first time patients."

Throwback Thursday: "Alcopops are for adults" edition

In 1999, Smirnoff Ice was introduced and the company that makes these alcopops dismissed public health claims that their fruit-flavored products targeted minors.  Despite ads appearing in media with large youth audiences.

Image from the
Center for Alcohol Marketing and Youth

Marijuana is not popular

The idea that marijuana is “popular” and use is “prolific” pops up in many news articles lately.  Just this past weekend, the New York Times Magazine included an article, “The Bud Light-ification of Bud”, that in the beginning states, “. . . marijuana’s popularity as a consumer product: 38 percent of Americans admit to having tried it, and 7 percent use it on a regular basis."

Wait, what?  Since when does 7% equal “popular”? 

Let’s see how it compares to other “popular” substances. 

• Two-thirds of American adults drink alcohol.  Now that’s popular.
• Tobacco, with 18% of American adults smoking, is more popular than marijuana. 

Yet, a few times in the article, and in other news stories about marijuana, it is called popular.

In our state, data readily indicate that marijuana use is not “popular".  According to research about the marijuana market, about 10% of Washingtonians 12 years old and older used marijuana within the past month.

Source: RAND Drug Policy Research Center, 2013

  

Even in King County, less than 10% of people 12 and older currently use marijuana. Among 10th grade students, 16% in King County and 23% in Seattle report current marijuana use according to the Healthy Youth Survey.   

The perception that marijuana use is “popular" or normal among adults and teenagers is a barrier to youth marijuana use prevention.  According to local researchers, perceived peer and adult norms favorable to marijuana use contribute to teenage marijuana use.  If teens perceive that adult marijuana use is widespread and socially acceptable (normal), they may view marijuana use as a way to project a desirable adult image.

Throwback Thursday: "Nicotine is not addictive" edition

In 1994, United States Congressman Henry Waxman held hearings about tobacco.  During the April 14, 1994 hearing, the presidents and CEOs of the seven largest American tobacco companies told members of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health and the Environment that they did not believe nicotine was addictive.

Vaporizers marketed to teenagers

Example of e-cigarette social media
marketing from "Gateway to Addiction?"
April 2014

From the Prevention Hub:

Even though e-cigarette makers have insisted on not targeting young adults with their products, a new report by a group of U.S. senators seems to have proven them otherwise. The report revealed that the nature of their products and their marketing strategy is likely to be geared towards the younger generation. E-cigarettes are available in a variety of flavours (i.e. Piña Colada, Vivid Vanilla and Cherry Crush) that seem to appeal to youth in particular. As far as their advertising is concerned, they were found to give out free samples at youth events and extensively market their products on social media sites. E-cigarettes continue to cause controversy with some considering them as an aid to quit smoking while others see them as a ‘gateway’ for smoking traditional cigarettes.

Link:  Gateway to Addiction: A Survey of Popular Electronic Cigarette Manufacturers and Targeted Marketing to Youth

Marijuana business owner hopes customers "use common sense" and don't distribute to minors

Earlier this week, one edition of KING 5's New Day Northwest focused on marijuana and several people were interviewed on a variety of related topics.  Here is the segment dealing with marijuana businesses.



When asked about what he will do to ensure that minors don't get marijuana sold at his store, the retail business licensee notes that "unfortunately" he cannot control what customers do once they leave his store but he hopes that they will "use common sense."  After a short laugh he notes that this may be "a hard thing to believe."

In the news: Teens using vaporizers, hash oil

KIRO recently broadcast a few stories about concentrated marijuana products (hash oil) and vaporizing devices used to consume them. 

This first video is about teenagers and vaporizers.



This graphic accompanies a report about recent hash oil related explosions in the Puget Sound:

In the past year, there have been at least six hash-oil related explosions across the Puget Sound area. "Hash oil, for us, it's almost like the next meth lab phenomenon," Seattle Police Sergeant Sean Whitcomb told KIRO 7.

Throwback Thursday: "Cigarettes are safe" edition

From Stanford School of Medicine:

One common technique used by the tobacco industry to reassure a worried public was to incorporate images of physicians in their ads. The none-too-subtle message was that if the doctor, with all of his expertise, chose to smoke a particular brand, then it must be safe.  

This genre of ads regularly appeared in medical journals such as the Journal of the American Medical Association, an organization which for decades collaborated closely with the industry. The big push to document health hazards also did not arrive until later.

The ads in this particular theme are all from a single R. J. Reynolds campaign which ran from 1940 to 1949 and claimed that "More Doctors smoke Camels." 

Local police to incur new costs when enforcing new marijuana law

Despite Liquor Control Board rules prohibiting the delivery of marijuana products to consumers, KING 5 recently profiled an unlicensed recreational marijuana business that is doing exactly that and thriving.



When asked if deliveries are legal, the business owner responds, "What we do is defensible."  The KING 5 reporter states that the rule against delivery is to be enforced by local police, in this case the Seattle Police Department, and that they are taking a "wait and see" approach.  When the law is enforced, local tax dollars will be used to pay for police activities.

Throwback Thursday: "Flawed research" edition

From the History Channel:



On January 11, 1964, Luther Terry issued the first surgeon general's report on smoking and health, linking cigarette smoking with lung cancer, heart disease and emphysema. A broadcast discusses the controversy surrounding the surgeon general's report as the tobacco industry is quick to discount the study's findings.