双语新闻：大麻的危险性低于酒精与烟草？

2014-08-25 17:52:31来源：可可英语

　　Impact on Young People

　　对年轻人的影响

　　One of the favorite arguments of legalization opponents is that marijuana is the pathway tomore dangerous drugs. But a wide variety of researchers have found no causal factor pushingusers up the ladder of harm. While 111 million Americans have tried marijuana, only a third ofthat number have tried cocaine, and only 4 percent heroin. People who try marijuana are morelikely than the general population to try other drugs, but that doesn’t mean marijuanaprompted them to do so.

　　反对大麻合法化的人最常用的论据之一，就是大麻会导致使用者尝试更危险的毒品。但各种广泛研究证明，大麻与使用者升级使用更危险的物品之间不存在因果关系。1.11亿美国人都曾尝试使用大麻，尝试使用可卡因的人只有该数字的1/3，尝试使用海洛因的人只相当于这个数字的4%。在使用大麻的人群中，尝试其他毒品的人数比例要比普通人群为高，但并不是大麻导致了此行为。

　　Marijuana “does not appear to be a gateway drug to the extent that it is the cause or even thatit is the most significant predictor of serious drug abuse,” the Institute of Medicine study said.The real gateway drugs are tobacco and alcohol, which young people turn to first before tryingmarijuana.

　　药学研究中心的报告说，大麻“并不是一种入门药物，并不是药物严重滥用的原因，甚至也不是药物严重滥用的重要预示因素”。真正的入门药物是烟草和酒精，年轻人早在尝试大麻之前就已经接触到它们了。

　　It’s clear, though, that marijuana is now far too easy for minors to obtain, which remains asignificant problem. The brain undergoes active development until about age 21, and there isevidence that young people are more vulnerable to the adverse effects of marijuana.

　　不过，对于未成年人来说，如今获取大麻显然非常容易，这仍然是个严重的问题。大脑发育活动要持续到21岁，有证据表明年轻人更容易受大麻副作用影响。

　　A long-term study based in New Zealand, published in 2012, found that people who begansmoking heavily in their teens and continued into adulthood lost an average of eight I.Q. pointsby age 38 that could not be fully restored. A Canadian study published in 2002 also found anI.Q. loss among heavy school-age users who smoked at least five joints a week.

　　2012年，一项新西兰的长期研究表明，从十几岁开始大量使用大麻，并在成年期持续使用大麻的人到38岁时智商会下降8分，无法完全恢复。另一项加拿大于2002年发布的研究表明，学龄期大量使用大麻(每周至少吸五支大麻烟卷)会导致智商下降。

　　The case is not completely settled. The New Zealand study was challenged by a Norwegianresearcher who said socio-economic factors may have played a role in the I.Q. loss. But therecent review by experts at the National Institute on Drug Abuse concluded that adults whosmoked heavily in adolescence had impaired neural connections that interfered with thefunctioning of their brains. Early and frequent marijuana use has also been associated withpoor grades, apathy and dropping out of school, but it is unclear whether consumptiontriggered the poor grades.

　　这项结论并未完全定案。新西兰的研究受到挪威一个研究者的质疑，他声称社会经济因素也可能导致智商下降。但国家药物滥用研究所最近的专家报告认为，从青春期就大量使用大麻的人的神经连接会受到损害，从而影响大脑功能。过早经常使用大麻也与成绩不佳、缺乏兴趣和辍学有关，但成绩不佳是否由使用大麻导致，目前尚不明确。

　　Restricting marijuana to adults is more important now that Colorado merchants are selling THC,the drug’s active ingredient, in candy bars, cookies and other edible forms likely to appeal tominors. Experience in Colorado has shown that people can quickly ingest large amounts of THCthat way, which can produce frightening hallucinations.

　　目前，更重要的是把大麻的使用局限在成年人范围之内，科罗拉多州商人正在贩卖掺入四氢大麻酚(这是大麻的活性成分，简称THC)的糖果、饼干，以及其他可食用物品，这对未成年人来说可能很有吸引力。科罗拉多的经验表明人们可以通过食用途径，迅速吸收大量THC，这有可能导致可怕的幻觉。

本文关键字: 大麻的危险性低于酒精与烟草？