Liberty Is Dangerous

[ladajo]

Simon:
This would indicate your numbers are way high.

http://oas.samhsa.gov/NSDUH/2k10NSDUH/t ... tm#Tab1.1B

Table 1.1B – Types of Illicit Drug Use in Lifetime, Past Year, and Past Month among Persons Aged 12 or Older: Percentages, 2009 and 2010

Lifetime (2009) 47.1%
Lifetime (2010) 47.1%
Past Year (2009) 15.1%
Past Year (2010) 15.3%
Past Month (2009) 8.7%
Past Month (2010) 8.9%

Table 1.6B – Types of Illicit Drug Use in Lifetime, Past Year, and Past Month among Persons Aged 21 to 25: Percentages, 2009 and 2010

Lifetime (2009) 61.3%
Lifetime (2010) 59.8%
Past Year (2009) 34.6%
Past Year (2010) 33.2%
Past Month (2009) 20.5%
Past Month (2010) 20.5%

Table 1.8B – Types of Illicit Drug Use in Lifetime, Past Year, and Past Month among Persons Aged 35 or Older: Percentages, 2009 and 2010

Lifetime (2009) 45.5%
Lifetime (2010) 45.4%
Past Year (2009) 8.4%
Past Year (2010) 8.8%
Past Month (2009) 4.9%
Past Month (2010) 4.9%

Illicit Drugs include marijuana/hashish, cocaine (including crack), heroin, hallucinogens, inhalants, or prescription-type psychotherapeutics used nonmedically.

It is also important to consider that lifetime data is a reflection of national cultural curves for the periods lived. And, as each age group progresses forward it takes its history with it. So with this in mind, for example, one would expect a higher lifetime percentage for an age group that was "of age" during the 60's and 70's than say a group that was "of age" in the 40's and 50's.

In any event, Simon, where did you get your numbers?

[ladajo]

Ladajo, in all fairness one has to say that these are two completely different numbers.
Yours are the numbers of people per a certain age that have used in the past month
Msimon was talking about people having tried an illegal drug in the past year. I dont think that the two can be compared like that.

Skip, thanks, I know that, but split out the post with annual numbers. I tried to note that there was a difference with:

The 2010 National Report the monthly take that varies greatly from your annual numbers.

But I guess I was not clear enough.
In any event my follow on post included the lifetime/annual/last month, but I did not see a nice graph like the monthly version I posted. So I had to type it all up manual.
That said, the curve trending does seem to match monthly to annual. The monthly to annual appears to hold at about double.

Here is a better summary table:
http://oas.samhsa.gov/NSDUH/2k10NSDUH/t ... m#Tab1.11B

and the root link for finding what tbale you want to look at:
http://oas.samhsa.gov/NSDUH/2k10NSDUH/t ... #TopOfPage

Edit: Added table links

[CKay]

Psilocybe semilanceata - magic mushrooms - grow the length and breadth of the British Isles. Their psychedelic effects have been widely known since the 60's, yet relatively few people have tried them - fewer still taken them more than once.

And yet the Indians in South American routinely chew coca leaves. Whoda thunk? Fortunately for them, Nature doesn't refine and concentrate the active ingredient, which just goes to show that in a small enough dosage, dangerous stuff is relatively harmless.

As with cannabis there's no need for processing magic mushrooms. The active ingredient psilocybin is present in sufficient concentrations for a few mushrooms to be quite potent. Other than a very slightly reduced onset time, the effects of ingesting psilocybin in it's pure form and raw mushrooms would be identical. The same can not be said for cocaine vs coca.

And comparing an addictive stimulant like cocaine with a completely non-addictive psychedelic such as psilocybin is anyway a completely fatuous comparison.

You should perhaps learn more before you opine.

[Skipjack]

Magic mushrooms are very dangerous. I knew a few ravers that would consume them with yoghurt before a rave. One of them died...
I would not touch this stuff with a ten foot pole, not even before that. Why would anyone in their right mind eat poisonous mushrooms?

[ladajo]

Another interesting trend with drugs users is that there is a massive decline in the percentage of folks who have tried drugs at least once (lifetime), the past year, or past month after age 50. It would seem one could argue that part of the trend may be due to drug users dying off faster than non-users. Thus the precipitous percentage drops.

The all three trend down after about 50, but most noticeable is the huge drop in the lifetime use reports. Very interesting.

[Diogenes]

Psilocybe semilanceata - magic mushrooms - grow the length and breadth of the British Isles. Their psychedelic effects have been widely known since the 60's, yet relatively few people have tried them - fewer still taken them more than once.

And yet the Indians in South American routinely chew coca leaves. Whoda thunk? Fortunately for them, Nature doesn't refine and concentrate the active ingredient, which just goes to show that in a small enough dosage, dangerous stuff is relatively harmless.

As with cannabis there's no need for processing magic mushrooms. The active ingredient psilocybin is present in sufficient concentrations for a few mushrooms to be quite potent. Other than a very slightly reduced onset time, the effects of ingesting psilocybin in it's pure form and raw mushrooms would be identical. The same can not be said for cocaine vs coca.

Perhaps you aren't getting my point. People with Coca leaves WANT the effect, that's why the chewing of them is so ubiquitous in the areas where they grow. Apparently the people who have access to the magic mushrooms aren't all that enthralled with their psychedelic high.

And comparing an addictive stimulant like cocaine with a completely non-addictive psychedelic such as psilocybin is anyway a completely fatuous comparison.

Amen. So why did you offer mushrooms as an example of how people are NOT getting addicted to them? (hint. Not as many people like the effect as do that of cocaine.)

My effort at mentioning Coca leaves was to point out a contrast, not a similarity.

You should perhaps learn more before you opine.

Actually, I should quit paying attention to crap so that I don't have to explain to crap peddlers why what they are peddling, is crap. I put the drug advocacy crowd in the same league as "Gaia Worshipers."

A Whole lot of religious fervor, but not much common sense.

[Diogenes]

Magic mushrooms are very dangerous. I knew a few ravers that would consume them with yoghurt before a rave. One of them died...
I would not touch this stuff with a ten foot pole, not even before that. Why would anyone in their right mind eat poisonous mushrooms?

Well, cocaine and heroine are not dangerous.

[Skipjack]

Well, cocaine and heroine are not dangerous.

Not quite the point I wanted to make...

[CKay]

Magic mushrooms are very dangerous. I knew a few ravers that would consume them with yoghurt before a rave. One of them died...I would not touch this stuff with a ten foot pole, not even before that. Why would anyone in their right mind eat poisonous mushrooms?

Excuse me, but that is just uninformed bollox...

The toxicity of psilocybin is low, that of Psilocybin mushrooms much lower.

"nearly 1.7 kilograms (3.7 lb) of dried mushrooms, or 17 kilograms (37 lb) of fresh mushrooms, would be required for a 60-kilogram (130 lb) person to reach the 280 mg/kg LD50 value of rats. Based on the results of animal studies, the lethal dose of psilocybin has been extrapolated to be 6 grams, 1000 times greater than the effective dose of 6 milligrams. The Registry of Toxic Effects of Chemical Substances assigns psilocybin a relatively high therapeutic index of 641 (higher values correspond to a better safety profile); for comparison, the therapeutic indices of aspirin and nicotine are 199 and 21, respectively."

"a 2010 Dutch study ranked the relative harm of psilocybin mushrooms compared to a selection of 19 recreational drugs, including alcohol, cannabis, cocaine, ecstasy, heroin, and tobacco. Magic mushrooms were ranked as the illicit drug with the lowest harm, corroborating conclusions reached earlier by expert groups in the United Kingdom"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psilocybin ... _potential

You didn't say how your friend died - other than that at some unspecified point beforehand he took 'magic mushrooms'. One thing is almost certain, toxicity due to ingestion of psilocybin was not the cause of death.

[CKay]

I put the drug advocacy crowd in the same league as "Gaia Worshipers."

Good job I'm not advocating drug use. (Is anyone?)

[CKay]

So why did you offer mushrooms as an example of how people are NOT getting addicted to them?

The comment was in reply to ScottL's remark -

I just don't think I'd start doing drugs just because they're available.

Note: he didn't qualify 'drugs' to mean only addictive substances.

[CKay]

cocaine and heroine are not dangerous.

Hmm... of course cocaine is dangerous, but heroine... any particular heroine in mind? Scarlett O'Hara? Eliza Doolittle? Jane Eyre...?

[Diogenes]

Well, cocaine and heroine are not dangerous.

Not quite the point I wanted to make...

Sometimes I'm just here for comic relief.

[Diogenes]

I put the drug advocacy crowd in the same league as "Gaia Worshipers."

Good job I'm not advocating drug use. (Is anyone?)

Is there a hair somewhere that you are splitting?


Congress may say that it is not advocating corn, while passing subsidies that cause more of it.

[Diogenes]

So why did you offer mushrooms as an example of how people are NOT getting addicted to them?

The comment was in reply to ScottL's remark -

I just don't think I'd start doing drugs just because they're available.

Note: he didn't qualify 'drugs' to mean only addictive substances.

Non addictive drugs would seem outside the topic of addiction, but that's just me.

Metronidazole might be controlled, (or in MSimon's phraseology "prohibited") but it is not addictive. If people were wrecking their lives (and more importantly the lives of others) with it, then it might be worthwhile to include it in a conversation about drug usage and abuse.