Clever teens most at risk of ‘skunk’ psychosis
Extra strong strain of cannabis could trigger schizophrenia
TEENAGERS who are brighter and more sociable are among those most at risk of mental illness caused by smoking a potent form of cannabis, an expert has warned.
Professor Robin Murray said it tended to be clever and sociable teenagers who were damaged by using the strain of the drug known as skunk.
Prof. Murray, an authority on the effects of smoking cannabis, led a landmark study with colleagues at the British Institute of Psychiatry which found that regularly smoking skunk tripled the risk of psychosis.
Now he has given further alarming warnings after his study was published in The Lancet Psychiatry. Yesterday, he said that skunk now dominated the cannabis market and was so widely used that it was a gateway drug to tobacco.
In addition, skunk is leaving some users with schizophrenia. Skunk is more commonly used in Britain than in Ireland but there is a growing market for it here.
Prof. Murray said: ‘Twenty-five years ago, if parents or siblings of a patient with schizophrenia asked me: “Could it have had anything at all to do with the cannabis he smoked?”, I’d have said: “There’s no evidence that’s the case.” Now we know there are these risks.’
He said: ‘A lot of people who develop schizophrenia have had problems since they were children. Maybe they had more personality or cognitive difficulties than their siblings. But the ones who develop psychosis associated with cannabis, they tend to be people who were doing very well.
‘Their parents always say, “They had lots of friends, were good at
‘Now we know there are risks’
school, good at sport.” In ways, their problem was that they were so sociable: they were street-smart and could get cannabis when they were 13.’
Those who had suffered a single psychotic episode such as hallucinations or delusions tended to get better if they gave up smoking skunk.
But, he said a proportion would not recover: ‘A third of people with cannabis-induced schizophrenia don’t stop. People who persist in smoking cannabis have the worst outcomes.’
Recent state studies have found there have been ‘surges’ in cannabis cultivation in Ireland with much of what is sold is skunk coming from indoor grow-houses and much more potent than previous types sold.