Did Cannabis Really Kill Gemma Moss? – You Decide

Gemma Moss

The death of 31-year-old British resident Gemma Moss is, without a doubt, a tragedy any way you look at it. I want to be very clear at the outset that, while I am suspicious of the coroner’s ruling of a cannabis overdose, I in no way intend to comment on, or judge Ms. Moss’ lifestyle. As a parent, my heart is breaking for her children who now have the daunting task of learning to move on in a shockingly different world.

Initial reports surfaced last week claiming that Ms. Moss had died due to cannabis toxicity. This has sort of thrown the cannabis world in disarray as we have long been claiming that marijuana is virtually impossible to overdose on.

Our friends over at High Times released an article questioning this cause of death. Some points worth noting:

• It is thought that Ms. Moss was prescribed numerous anti-depressants that may have been a factor

• The conclusion of cannabis overdose was reached simply because the doctor could not find anything wrong with her vital organs and there was a moderate to high level of cannabis in her system. I am no doctor and I won’t even pretend to have authority on this matter, but I do know that things are not always as they appear. If you walked into your house and it was all of a sudden painted red, of course you want to blame the guy with red paint on his fingers. Scientific inquiry tells us that correlation is not necessarily causation.

• High Times interviewed a Colorado physician who provides MMJ authorizations. The Dr. was exceptionally skeptical that cannabis alone was the cause of death. He did concede that cannabis can temporarily increase the heart rate, but said that unless there is some pre-existing cardiac condition, it is not a danger. (A belief shared by many doctors)

My own thoughts:
Speaking from experience of smoking bad weed, weed that was probably laced with something, smoking with cheap rolling papers, etc. I also have a hard time believing that cannabis is the culprit here. If it was what she smoked, I’d like to examine the weed itself. If it was a joint, was there a toxic glue on the paper? Who knows where the bud came from, if chemicals were used on it, if it was laced with something. Also considering that Ms. Moss had been a long time pot smoker, it seems strange that she would only now have a negative reaction.

Look, if it ever actually gets irrefutably proven that cannabis did, in fact, kill Ms. Moss, we in the cannabis community cannot and should not bury our heads in the sand and pretend it’s not true. Our world-view will have to adjust to allow for the truth. However, given the multi-millenia history of safe cannabis use and the relatively topical investigation into Ms. Moss’ death, I am far from ready to say that cannabis is now a deadly drug.

Just as a point of interest, it is also possible to die from water toxicity. No one will ever tell you that water is a deadly substance that you should handle responsibly (unless you’re a boater). Seeing as how the opinion of cannabis seems to be in the midst of a global re-imagining, I also have some conspiracy nutter theories in my mind about the timeliness of this report and it’s attention-grabbing headline.