What were Minnesota legislators thinking when they legalized THC edibles? Makes you wonder if they were all “high” on something. Or were they in such a hurry they didn’t notice what they were doing?
The law was, at best, rushed through without adequate research into enforcement parameters and packaging.
Legislators claim the law doesn’t allow THC to be marketed as candy, but it’s happening anyway. In some places, there are even “rip-offs” of famous candies and snacks, packed in bags that look like popular brands of chips, gummies or lollipops – the very treats sweet-tooth kids love.
In their cravings for candy, children are known to snoop in drawers, climb chairs to reach kitchen cupboards and plunder like pirates an entire house in search of hidden treasures – tasty treats.
Imagine parents buying a bag (or two or three) of THC edibles (let’s say cherry-flavored gummies) and then carelessly leaving the bag or bags on the kitchen table or elsewhere.
Kids discover them: “Red gummies! Yummy!” They proceed to gobble a bunch of them down. Each bag of edibles can contain, legally, 50 milligrams of THC, 5 milligrams in each of 10 pieces of “candy.”
Now here’s the big scary question: What effect(s) would 50 milligrams of THC have on a child? Or even 5 milligrams if the child ate only one piece? It’s awful even to ponder.
Sales of THC are limited strictly to people 21 years old or older. Oh (and get this!), they must be sold in child-proof bags. What kind of bag or anything else is “child-proof?” All too many children have been injured or killed by unsecured guns in the home, or (along with pets) sickened or killed by toxic products in the home, or by drugs (even some prescription ones) easily accessible in cupboards or medicine chests.
Some are calling Minnesota’s sudden legalization of THC “marijuana-legalization lite.” It would seem so. In many states (18 at last count), using marijuana is now legal. It’s a good thing that “weed” is now being de-criminalized. Back in the 1960s, the heyday of hippies, some people (especially in Texas) were slapped with huge, unpayable fines and viciously long prison sentences (20 years in one case) just for using or selling “weed.”
In recent years, many people have been helped medically by derivatives of marijuana – those suffering from chronic pain, from post-traumatic-stress disorder, from cancer, from obstructive sleep disturbances, and more. Medical marijuana (cannabis), thankfully, is now legal in 39 states, including Minnesota.
However, before Minnesota expands legal medical marijuana to widespread legal use of the drug, legislators had better first do their homework. What problems, if any, has marijuana caused in states where it is now legal? Has it contributed to car accidents, for example? Marijuana affects people in different ways. Yes, many smoke it and get pleasantly relaxed, laid-back, mellow, “high.” But it has also been known to cause anxiety, panic attacks and paranoid reactions in some people. Imagine driving a car when feeling like that.
If adequate research and reliable statistics determine cannabis is so benign and not a threat to public safety, then yes, Minnesota should consider legalizing it.
In the meantime, we now have THC in the form of delicious little candies. It’s inexcusable if not criminal that a drug substance aimed strictly for adults is being sold in candy!
It’s like those “candy cigarettes” sold years ago. How many tobacco companies backed such “candy” to prime kids for the real things (cancer sticks) later in their lives?
The very least they could do (and it should be mandated) is to put their drug into tidbit snacks that taste absolutely awful – sour or bitter. Adults who want their THC bad enough will just have to get it down their gullets one way or another.
Children who happen upon the “treats” will pop them into their mouths, make “icky-sticker” faces and spit them out. As well they should!
