HOW THC MOVES THROUGH THE BODY

HOW THC MOVES THROUGH THE BODY

When marijuana is smoked, the rich blood supply of the lungs rapidly absorbs the THC. This applies to marijuana that is "vaporized" as well. Even though it is not burned, the THC that is mobilized from the plant material in the vaporizer is absorbed through the lungs. Because blood from the lungs goes directly from the heart to the brain, the high, as well as the effects on heart rate and blood vessels, occurs within minutes. Much of the THC is actually gone from the brain within a few hours after smoking. However, THC also accumulates in significant concentrations in other organs, such as the liver, kidneys, spleen, and testes. THC readily crosses from the blood of a pregnant woman into the placenta and reaches the developing fetus.

How the smoker smokes makes a difference in how much of the THC from the marijuana actually gets to the body. A cigarette allows for approximately 10 to 20 percent of the THC in the marijuana to be trans­ferred. A pipe is somewhat more efficient, allowing about 40 to 50 percent to transfer, and a water pipe (or bong) is quite efficient. Because the water pipe traps the smoke until it is inhaled, theoretically the only THC lost is what the smoker exhales. Vaporizers allow a very efficient transfer of THC because, in addition to taking advantage of the rich blood supply in the lungs, vaporized pot does not create smoke that can be irritating to the lungs and cause a person to limit his inhalation or to cough out a "hit" that is too big. This can be a problem as well, particularly when a smoker first switches to a vapor system. Smokers are used to the feeling of smoke in their lungs and often use that feeling as a gauge by which they estimate their intake. The vapor does not irritate the lungs, so that gauge is missing and some new vapor users take in far more THC than they intend until they figure out a new way to estimate their intake.

Although much of the high wears off relatively soon after smoking, THC remains in the body much longer. About half of the THC is still in the blood twenty hours after smoking. And once the blood carrying the THC passes through the liver, some of the THC is converted into other compounds that may remain there for several days. Some of these metab­olites have psychoactive effects as well, so that although the initial high may disappear within an hour or two, some of the effects of marijuana on mental and physical functions may last for days.

Not only may THC and its metabolites stay in the blood for days but they also stay in the fatty deposits of the body much longer because they are very lipid-soluble—they easily get absorbed into and stored in fat. THC stored in fatty deposits is released from these tissues slowly over a rather long period of time before finally being eliminated. What all this means is that about 30 percent of ingested THC (and its metabolites) may remain in the body a full week after smoking and may continue to affect mental and physical functions subtly. In fact, the remnants from a single large dose of THC may be detectable up to three weeks later.

All of these rules also apply when marijuana is eaten instead of smoked, except that less THC gets to the brain and it takes a lot longer for it to get there. When marijuana (or any drug) is taken into the stomach, the blood that absorbs it goes to the liver before flowing to the rest of the body (including the brain). This means two things: First, the liver breaks down some of the THC before it ever has a chance to affect the brain. Second, the remaining THC reaches the brain more slowly because of its indirect route through the bloodstream. However, because the body absorbs THC more slowly when marijuana is eaten, the peak levels of the drug last lon­ger (though they are lower than they would be if the same amount were smoked).

Whether the user eats or smokes marijuana and the accompanying differences in the way THC is distributed and metabolized appear to have a substantial impact on the kind of experience he has. Rather than experiencing a sudden change from being straight to being high, the marijuana eater experiences a slow and gradual shift that lasts longer. Many experienced users report that what happens after eating marijuana is more reminiscent of a mild mushroom or LSD trip; it's not simply "getting high." Because high levels of THC can cause hallucinogen-like experiences, people who have eaten marijuana and reported such feel­ings may actually have achieved higher levels of THC than many smok­ers—despite the fact that some of it is metabolized by the liver before it gets to the brain—because they ate a larger amount than they would likely have smoked.

DRUG PREPARATIONS: FROM "HEADACHE POT TO HOSPITAL POT

DRUG PREPARATIONS: FROM "HEADACHE POT" TO "HOSPITAL POT"

The products made from marijuana plants for psychoactive effects vary markedly in their THC content and therefore in their psychoactive potency.

Low-grade marijuana is made from all the leaves of both sexes of the plant. These vegetative leaves contain very little THC compared to the pistillate flowers of the female plant or to the smaller leaves adjacent to them. The THC content of such a preparation may be only 1 percent or lower. Smokers sometimes call this "headache pot" because smoking it can produce more of a headache than a high.

Medium-grade marijuana is made from the dried flowering tops of female cannabis plants raised with and fertilized by male plants. Fertil­ization limits the psychoactive potency of the resulting marijuana because the female flowers secrete THC-containing resin only until fertilization. After that time the flower no longer needs the protective resin, and it begins to produce a seed.

High-grade marijuana is made from the flowering tops, or "cola," of female plants raised in isolation from male plants. The resulting mari­juana is called sinsemilla, which means "without seeds." As the female flowers mature without fertilization, they continually secrete resin to coat the delicate flowers and small leaves surrounding them; the flowers grow in thick clusters, heavy with resin. When these "buds" are har­vested and dried, they contain an average of around? to 8 percent THC. Some samples of sinsemilla test as high as 20 percent.

Such powerful marijuana has been called "hospital pot" because occa­sionally an unsuspecting smoker, expecting the usual gentle high of medium-grade marijuana, gets frightened by the sudden and powerful high of sinsemilla, panics, and winds up in the emergency room. Actu­ally, the best treatment for such a scare is a calm and reassuring "talk down" by a friend. The feeling of panic often arises from an unexpected sense of loss of control, and the individual needs only to be reassured that he is safe and that nothing will threaten him. Some cultivators in the United States, using well-controlled indoor growing conditions, produce marijuana with THC concentrations as high as 24 percent, but the THC content of most marijuana in the United States is in the range of 10 percent. In recent years United States marijuana has been touted as being ten times more potent now than it was in the 1960s and 1970s. This claim isn't exactly true. Since the 1970s the TUG content of marijuana seized by US law-enforcement officials has been measured by the Potency Monitoring Project in Mississippi—a government-funded project. In the early 1970s they generally reported that samples of seized marijuana contained low concentrations of THC—in the range of 0.4 to 1 percent—but those samples often came from low-potency, high-volume Mexican “kilobricks," which probably contained considerably less THC than most of the marijuana that was actually being smoked in those days. Also, it was not until the late 1970s that the higher-potency cannabis products available to smokers, such as buds and sinsern ilia, were included in the samples analyzed by the Potency Monitoring Project. Thus, esti­mates of THC content in the 1970s probably underestimated the average 'INC content of the marijuana smoked during that period. When inde­pendent laboratories analyzed marijuana samples during the 1970s, THC contents were often considerably higher than those reported by the Potency Monitoring Project—in the 2 to 5 percent range—though lower than most marijuana samples today. After 1980 the seized marijuana tested by the Potency Monitoring Project included more representative samples of what was available on the street, and between 1981 and 2000 the TUG content hovered between 2 and 5 percent—consistent with the average range of independently tested samples during the 1970s. Still, marijuana cultivators have gotten better at their business, and it is reason­able to assert that THC concentrations in recreationally used marijuana have increased significantly. They may continue to increase as well. The recent changes in both medical marijuana and recreational marijuana laws in some states will probably help to fuel further refinements in both genetic plant selection as well as growing techniques. Although there are alternatives to smoking marijuana, such as eating it or vaporizing it, most marijuana is still smoked, and for most people the less smoke they need to take in, the better. The higher the concentration of cannabinoids in mari­juana, the less needs to be smoked, so our bet is that cultivators will be motivated to continue looking for ways to increase the cannabinoid con­tent in marijuana.

Hashish is produced when the resin of the cannabis plant is separated from the plant material. The purest form of hashish is virtually 100 per­cent resin. In India this pure material is called charas. Most hashish, how­ever, is not pure resin and contains varying amounts of plant material as well. It often appears as a dark-colored gummy ball that is rather hard, but not brittle. The average THC content of hashish is around 8 percent but can vary quite a bit—up to 20 percent. Hashish is often smoked in a pipe or rolled into a cigarette along with tobacco or lower-grade mari­juana. A more traditional means of smoking hashish is to ignite a small piece and let it burn under a glass or cup. The user then tilts back the glass and inhales the smoke from underneath.

Hash oil is the most potent of the preparations made from the cannabis plant. After the plant is boiled in alcohol, the solids are filtered out, and when the water evaporates, what's left is hash oil. Hash oil is generally a thick, waxy substance that is very high in THC content—ranging from 20 to 70 percent. It can be scraped onto the inner rim of a pipe bowl for smoking or used to lace tobacco or marijuana cigarettes.

THE CANNABIS PLANT AND ITS PRODUCTS

THE CANNABIS PLANT AND ITS PRODUCTS

Cannabis is a highly versatile plant. Hemp, a strong fiber in the stem, has been used to make rope, cloth, and paper. When dried, the leaves and flowers are used as marijuana for their psychoactive and medicinal effects. The roots of the plant have also been used to make medicines, and the ancient Chinese used the seeds as a food. Cannabis seeds are still used for oil and animal feed.

The two most prevalent species of cannabis are Cannabis sativa and Cannabis indica. In years past, people cultivated C. sativa to make hemp. Under natural conditions, it will grow as high as a lanky fifteen to twenty feet, and it still grows wild as a weed across the southern United States. C. indica has been cultivated throughout the world mostly for the psy­choactive properties of its resins. These plants generally grow to no more than a few feet in height and develop a thicker, bushier appearance than C. sativa.

The cannabis plant contains more than four hundred chemicals, and several of them are psychoactive. By far the most psychoactive of these is delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), found in the plant's resin. The resin is most concentrated in the flowers. In an unfertilized plant, it provides a sticky coating that protects the flowers from excessive heat from the sun and enhances contact by grains of pollen. The vegetative leaves contain a small amount of resin, as do the stalks, but the concentrations in these parts of the plant are so low as to have little intoxicating effect.

Today, much cultivation of 'drug" strain marijuana plants has occurred, but the amount of THC present in the flowers of individual plants varies considerably. In addition to the genetic makeup of the plant, the growing conditions, timing of harvest, drying environment, and stor­age environment can all significantly influence the potency of the final product. As the plant matures, the balance of various chemicals in the resin changes, as does the amount of resin secreted at the flowering tops of the plant. Early in maturation, cannabidiolic acid (CBDA) predomi­nates and is converted to cannabidiol (CBD), which is converted to THC as the plant reaches its floral peak. The extent to which CBD is converted to THC largely determines the "drug quality" of the individual plant. When the plant matures into the late floral and senescent stages, THC is converted to cannabinol (CBN). A plant that is harvested at the peak flo­ral stage has a high ratio of TFIC to CBD and CBN, and the psychoactive effect is often described as a "clear," or "clean," high, with relatively little sedative effect. However, some cultivators allow the plants to mature past this peak to produce marijuana with a heavier, more sedative effect. The difference between the feelings associated with peak- versus late-har­vested marijuana has been described as the difference between being "high" and being "stoned."

Burning marijuana for smoking produces hundreds of additional com­pounds. So when someone smokes a single joint, hundreds upon hun­dreds of chemical compounds enter the body. We know that many of these compounds act on various organs and systems in the body, but we don't know what effects most of them have, either acutely or after pro­longed use. Many scientific studies have, therefore, restricted their atten‑ tion to THC, allowing us to evaluate at least some of the effects of cannabinoids on the brain and behavior.