Contribution of Marijuana Legalization to the U.S. Opioid Mortality Epidemic
The co-authors of this recently released study used opioid mortality data obtained from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to compare opioid death rate trends in each marijuana-legalizing state and the District of Columbia prior to and after medicinal and recreational legalization implementation with associated trends in non-legalizing states. 78% of legalizing jurisdictions showed a statistically significant acceleration of opioid death rates after legalization implementation at greater rates than the pre-legalization rate or the concurrent rate in non-legalizing states....