Emer Higgins, Dublin Mid-West deputy has raised her concerns over the kids in her constituency. She claims that the children are eating gummy bears and chocolate which contains cannabis.
She said that it has become a latest trend among the children and their parents are very much scared and upset regarding this. Cannabis has the power to make the consumers addictive to it and thus, it can become so serious when the next generation gets trapped in it at a very young age.
The Clondalkin Drugs Task Force has also raised the issue to the Fine Gael TD, where the force has spotted packaging in local parks in recent weeks.
In a Dáil debate on the national drugs strategy, Higgins said that the youngsters were pulled to candies and chocolates laced with cannabis.
She said that this is problematic for a number of reasons. First of all, the sugary taste of sweets and chocolate is clearly more attractive to children who may never experiment with cannabis if they were forced to smoke it.
“Secondly it takes far longer for people to feel the impact when eating cannabis. While the impact of smoking is immediate, the impact of eating cannabis is not felt for up to an hour.” She added
“Teenagers eat a square of cannabis laced chocolate, feel no impact and then eat the rest of the bar. As a result, they accidentally over-consume dangerous amounts of the drug. By the time the effects are felt, the teenager is in over their head.”
She pointed out that consuming the drug within sweets and chocolates have long lasting effects than smoking it.
“The effects of edible cannabis last far longer than smoked cannabis – as long as twelve hours. If the cannabis triggers psychosis or hallucinations, this will be hell for the teenager,” she said.
This is the reason why edible cannabis type drugs puts uneven number of people in hospital beds.
She also discussed the shocking study report from a hospital in Colorado, which says that candy like cannabis only makes 1pc of sales but they are capable of making 11pc of cannabis related hospital intakes.
Considering the context, Emer Higgins raised the need of awareness programs. She proposed the Minister for Drugs Strategy to conduct awareness programs, which makes the public understand the dangers of cannabis and other similar drugs.