According to a study published in the American Journal of Public Health, marijuana legislation in the state of Colorado has resulted in a “reversal” of opiate overdose deaths.
The authors, Melvin D. Livingston, Tracey E. Barnett, Chris Delcher and Alexander C. Wagenaar, wrote, “After Colorado’s legalization of recreational cannabis sale and use, opioid-related deaths decreased more than 6% in the following 2 years.”
The results are still preliminary as they only cover two years of data since the state’s first legal recreational marijuana shops opened in 2014.
According to the authors, policymakers will want to keep an eye on these numbers in the future to see if the decreasing trend continues.
The authors wrote, “These initial results clearly show that continuing research is warranted as data become available, involving longer follow-ups and additional states that have legalized recreational cannabis.”
The authors are also interested in observing if this trend was similar in states like Washington and Oregon where recreational marijuana has also been legal.
According to Robert Valuck, who coordinates the Colorado Consortium for Prescription Drug Abuse Prevention, “The whole thing is so convoluted, with so many different things going on in the marketplace, it’s virtually impossible to assign cause and effect or credit and blame to any one thing.”
