Cannabis and Youth: What's the big deal?
Using cannabis as a teenager can hurt a person’s school, work and social life, because the chemicals in cannabis can slow down those parts of the brain forever.
What are other names for cannabis?
Cannabis has many names: marijuana, marihuana, weed, grass, smoke, pot, dope, green, grass, hash, ganja, cush, skunk, spliff, doobie, shatter, trees, blunt, bud... Most of the names for cannabis have something to do with its effects on the brain and body, or the way it looks.
Cannabis is a drug that affects how the brain and body works. Whether it’s legal or illegal, it can still hurt the growth of a young person’s brain and body. It affects the body, feelings, thoughts and actions.
Cannabis can hurt a person’s ability to drive and do physical activities like sports. Cannabis also makes it harder to focus and remember for school and work.
Young people using cannabis have higher chances of becoming dependent on it, and getting addicted to other drugs later in life.
All smoke hurts the lungs, including cannabis smoke. This means people who smoke cannabis are more likely to get lung diseases.
Cannabis mixed with other substances, like alcohol or other drugs, makes it more likely for someone to overdose. This can be deadly.
The brain isn’t finished growing until about age 25. Teenaged years are the most important years, because that’s when the part of the brain that handles emotions, memory, thinking skills and relationships grows too.
Using cannabis as a teenager can hurt a person’s school, work and social life, because the chemicals in cannabis can slow down those parts of the brain forever.
