A Justice Department research says states may need to \u201cget away from that idea\u201d that marijuana impairment can be tested based on the concentration of THC in a person\u2019s system.<\/p>\n
Frances Scott, a physical scientist at the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) Office of Investigative and Forensic Sciences under DOJ, discussed the challenges of cannabis impairment testing in an episode of the Justice Today podcast that was posted late last month.<\/p>\n
Scott questioned the efficacy of setting \u201cper se\u201d THC limits for driving that some states have enacted, making it so a person can be charged with driving while impaired based on the concentration of cannabis components in their system. Ultimately, there may not be a way to assess impairment from THC like we do for alcohol, she said.<\/p>\n
One complication, Scott said, is that \u201cif you have chronic users versus infrequent users, they have very different concentrations correlated to different effects.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo the same effect level, if you will, will be correlated with a very different concentration of THC in the blood of a chronic user versus an infrequent user,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
That issue was also examined in a recent federally funded study that identified two different methods of more accurately testing for recent THC use<\/a> that accounts for the fact that metabolites of the cannabinoid can stay present in a person\u2019s system for weeks or months after consumption.<\/p>\n \u201cThe problem is we\u2019ve funded this research that pretty conclusively shows that the THC concentration in the blood is not particularly well-correlated with impairment for driving,\u201d Scott said. \u201cOne of the outstanding questions is trying to figure out, is there a good proxy, a good metric, that we can use?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf it\u2019s not delta-9 THC, is there another one of those cannabinoids that is a good metric, or do we need to kind of move away from that? With alcohol, we per se laws\u2014that\u2019s the 0.08 [blood alcohol content], right?\u201d she said<\/a>. \u201cIf we demonstrate that your blood alcohol content is over 0.08, that\u2019s all I have to do to prove impairment, right? That\u2019s also well-understood.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe what we need to do is kind of get away from that idea that we can sort of have a number when it comes to marijuana and have that mean that you\u2019re impaired,\u201d the researcher said. \u201cAnd it may get into some different types of measures than we\u2019re used to doing. So maybe it\u2019s not a blood measure or a breath measure.\u201d<\/p>\n While the Justice Department is continuing to support research into the development of a possible breathalyzer test for cannabis, there\u2019s also grant funding going to alternative screening options\u2014including saliva tests and peripheral vision assessments to determine if certain eye functioning could be associated with impairment from THC.<\/p>\n \u201cWe may need better tests,\u201d Scott\u2014who has also recently discussed the seemingly arbitrary way that Congress arrived as a 0.3 percent THC limit to define federally legal hemp<\/a>\u2014said.<\/p>\n The THC impairment question has been a major focus for lawmakers and the research community, particularly as it concerns driving laws.<\/p>\n Last summer, a congressional report for a Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (THUD) bill said that the House Appropriations Committee \u201ccontinues to support the development of an objective standard to measure marijuana impairment and a related field sobriety test to ensure highway safety<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-CO) sent a letter to the Department of Transportation (DOT) in 2022\u00a0seeking an update on that status of a federal report<\/a>\u00a0into research barriers that are inhibiting the development of a standardized test for marijuana impairment on the roads. The department was required to complete the report by November\u00a0under a large-scale infrastructure bill<\/a>\u00a0that President Joe Biden signed, but\u00a0it missed that deadline and it\u2019s unclear how much longer it will take<\/a>.<\/p>\n A study published in 2019 concluded that those who drive at the legal THC limit\u2014which is typically between two to five nanograms of THC per milliliter of blood\u2014were not statistically more likely to be involved in an accident<\/a>\u00a0compared to people who haven\u2019t used marijuana.<\/p>\n Separately, the\u00a0Congressional Research Service in 2019 determined<\/a>\u00a0that while \u201cmarijuana consumption can affect a person\u2019s response times and motor performance \u2026 studies of the impact of marijuana consumption on a driver\u2019s risk of being involved in a crash have produced conflicting results, with some studies finding little or no increased risk of a crash from marijuana usage.\u201d<\/p>\n Another study from 2022 found that smoking CBD-rich marijuana had\u00a0\u201cno significant impact\u201d on driving ability<\/a>, despite the fact that all study participants exceeded the per se limit for THC in their blood.<\/p>\n Marijuana Tax Revenue Should Fund Education And Housing, Not Police And Prisons, Voters Say In New Poll<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of Martin Alonso<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post Justice Department Researcher Says \u2018We May Need Better Tests\u2019 For Marijuana Impairment, Questioning \u2018Per Se\u2019 THC Limits For Driving<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
A Justice Department research says states may need to \u201cget away from that idea\u201d that marijuana impairment can be tested based on the concentration of THC in a person\u2019s system. Frances Scott, a physical scientist at the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) Office of Investigative and Forensic Sciences under DOJ,Continue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,15462],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72676"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72676"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72677,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72676\/revisions\/72677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: Justice Department Researcher Says \u2018We May Need Better Tests\u2019 For Marijuana Impairment, Questioning \u2018Per Se\u2019 THC Limits For Driving<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"