A new poll demonstrates shifting views on how to treat drug offenses in the country. Instead of jail time, most Americans favor recategorizing drug offenses.

In news that would’ve seemed inconceivable a decade ago, a new poll from libertarian think tank The Cato Institute found that 55% of American favor drug offenses not resulting in jail time. Instead, the majority of Americans favor “recategorizing drug offenses from felonies to civil offenses.” This would result in drug possession violations to “be treated like minor traffic violations rather than crimes.”

The news falls in line with a new trend of enforcing drug laws across the country. Last year, a Gallup poll reported that two-thirds of all Americans support legalizing marijuana. It also coincides with major American cities where cannabis has been legalized, like Seattle and San Francisco, expunging past marijuana convictions.

Unsurprisingly, the support for decriminalizing all drugs was favored more by Democrats (69%) and Independents (54%) than Republicans (40%) in the Cato Institute’s polling. To reach these conclusions, the Cato Institute surveyed more than 1,700 Americans through phone calls. Respondents were then asked whether they “favor or oppose re-categorizing drug offenses from felonies to civil offenses, meaning they would be treated like minor traffic violations rather than crimes.”

The questions comes at a time when American political leaders have reconsidered the negative impact brought by the War on Drugs, particularly on disenfranchised communities of color. Many presidential candidates for the Democratic nomination have announced they’d legalize marijuana should they be elected. Sen. Kamala Harris and former Rep. Beto O’Rourke have displayed the most aggressive marijuana reform, with O’Rourke calling for drug war reparations.

In addition, a Canadian lawmaker recently proposed legislation that would repeal federal law that prohibits the possession of illicit substances. Though Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith’s bill has a low chance of passing, it would effectively decriminalize all drugs in the country. Erskine-Smith believes drug offenses and addiction as a public health issue, not as a crime.

Most US banks shun people like Hope Wiseman, who runs a dispensary that sells marijuana for medical use.

But a bill designed to open up banking to those in the pot industry, such as herself, is sparking optimism as it makes its way through Congress.

Wiseman, who operates a dispensary called Mary and Main, in Capitol Heights, Maryland, just outside Washington, serves patients who suffer from migraine headaches, chronic illnesses or depression.

She feels lucky to already have an account at a bank, but says she is at the facility's mercy, since it could close it at any time.

Marijuana for medical use is legal in 33 states and the US capital of Washington, 12 of which have also legalized it for recreational use.

But under federal law, pot is still classified as a hard drug, just like cocaine. Most banks fear being charged with money laundering if they work with people in the legal marijuana industry.

Wiseman's bank is one of few that accept merchants like her as customers.

"We are charged very high fees because the business is so special, and we are just subject to their mercy," said Wiseman, who opened her dispensary last year.

Transactions are carried out mainly in cash, and when the money is deposited it takes several days to show up in her account, making it difficult to pay bills and employees' wages.

Wiseman's debit card only works with online transfers of crypto currency. The bank will not give her a credit card, deeming her a risk. And the bank can shut down her account over the slightest suspicion that a transaction is illegal.

- A small step ahead -

This wariness on the part of the banks also affects organizations that are regularly or occasionally involved with the marijuana industry.

Jenn Michelle Pedini, head of development at NORML, one of the main organizations lobbying for legalization of marijuana, said she had problems with the government when she helped a marijuana vendor set up a company under a consulting firm that she operates.

The pot industry is indeed booming, generating more than $10 billion a year in revenue which could hit $56 billion by 2025, accord to pro-legalization lobbies.

But of the 11,000 banks and other lenders operating in the United States, only 700 work with people in the marijuana sector, according to Treasury Department figures.

Last week the House of Representatives passed a bill designed to protect pot industry professionals and associated companies from running afoul of the federal government. It now goes to the Republican-controlled Senate.

Supporters of the SAFE Banking Act also say it reduces the risk of burglary and violent robbery in an industry where cash is king.

Critics of the bill say it gives drug cartels easier and less-monitored access to the financial sector.

Tanner Daniel, vice president for congressional relations at the American Bankers Association (ABA), called the bill's passage "a necessary incremental step forward."

- Taxing pot revenue -

"ABA is not taking a stance on legalization. 99 percent of members state that clarification is needed on the state and federal level," Daniel said at a recent forum in Washington.

Daniel added that 75 percent of ABA members have closed the accounts of customers potentially tied to the pot industry.

Republicans in the Senate tend to frown on use of marijuana.

Michael Correia, of marijuana lobbying group National Cannabis Industry Association, said Congress "is not ready to debate the merits of legalization."

"Politicians have been waiting for the polling and the public. It will be state, after state, after state, before the federal level," Correia said.

That is what Thiru Vignarajah, a former deputy attorney general in Maryland and candidate for mayor of Baltimore, wants to do -- legalize pot in the city, and hope the state eventually follows suit.

He also proposes taxing pot sales with a city-backed and -regulated crypto currency and using that money to invest heavily in education.

Legalization would also help in the fight against crime in Baltimore, one of the most violent cities in America, he said.

"The murder rate is among the highest in the country. The drug war between gangs is fuelling the overwhelming majority of it," Vignarajah told AFP.

He admitted, however, that pot is just part of the drug problem and legalizing it is no panacea.

Many people who use cannabis do it for the euphoric effects caused by the main psychoactive ingredient, tetrahydrocannabinol, often called THC. But THC can also cause unpleasant side effects like paranoia, dissociative thoughts, impaired memory or even psychotic episodes. As cannabis has become more potent, it is becoming more likely that some users will experience those effects. But another compound present in the plant, the non-psychoactive cannabidiol, actually works against THC and can block those negative effects.

Now a team of researchers led by Steven Laviolette, a neuroscientist at the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, has figured out how the two compounds interact in the brain, and how CBD, as cannabidiol is also known, balances out the negative psychiatric side effects of THC. Their work was published recently in the Journal of Neuroscience.

Working with rats, Laviolette focused on an area of the brain called the ventral hippocampus, which is involved in emotional control and is known to be vulnerable to some of the long-term effects of high-potency THC. Rats who were given THC exhibited many of the acute negative side effects in behavioral tests, such as anxiety about new environments, and problems with social interaction, memory, and their ability to filter out unnecessary sensory data. When they examined the rats’ brains after the tests, the researchers determined that the effects were caused by an overactive cellular signaling molecule called extracellular signal-regulated kinase, or ERK.

“We found that THC is overstimulating the ERK pathway, altering oscillation patterns in the brain linked to schizophrenia and disturbing the dopamine system,” said Laviolette.

Rats given both CBD and THC had normal ERK signals, and did not show signs of anxiety, paranoia or memory loss in the behavioral tests. The researchers believe that means that the CBD prevented the overstimulation of the ERK pathway.

Daniele Piomelli, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine who was not involved in the study, said CBD has been long suspected to modulate the effects of THC, but the mechanism has remained unclear. “This study is interesting because it provides at the molecular and synaptic level a mechanism by which CBD can counter THC,” he said.

Some previous studies suggested that CBD may counter THC by interfering with its ability to bind to THC’s main molecular target in the brain, the CB1 receptor. But Piomelli said that CBD’s modulating effect may not involve the CB1 receptor itself.

CBD is “pharmacologically messy,” said Laviolette, binding to a wide variety of different receptors in the body. Laviolette’s work shows that at some point in the intracellular machinery the two compounds share some kind of mechanism by which they can modulate each others’ actions, but “whether that is happening at the CB1 receptor, we still need to figure that out,” said Laviolette.

Piomelli said that this study is important because sorting out the biological mechanism will provide background for much-needed studies in humans on how CBD can affect the short- and long-term effects of THC. “It opens the door and offers insights that future studies in people could build upon,” he said.

While blocking many of the psychotropic effects of THC may seem counterproductive to recreational users, Laviolette said there are many people who use cannabis for medical reasons who may want to avoid them. “People using it for pain relief, anxiety, multiple sclerosis or glaucoma are not looking to get high,” he said. “If you want to avoid the negative effects, you may want to use strains that have a high CBD content.”

By the looks of it, Mike Tyson wants to become the Walt Disney of cannabis. The former boxer bought a 40-acre farm in California and transformed the land into Tyson Ranch, a fantasia that revolves around marijuana and features the world’s longest lazy river. As soon as possible, a.k.a. as soon as legalization laws change, plan exist to build another Tyson Ranch along the Florida-Georgia border.

But Tyson isn’t stopping there either. Tyson announced plans this week to deliver marijuana tourism to the Caribbean, with another marijuana theme park in the islands of Antigua and Barbados. The Tyson team intends to introduce a major marijuana conference as well, which will become the “Davos of cannabis” and launch in April 2020.

The tourism will drive relief efforts to the Caribbean islands still reeling from damages caused by Hurricane Maria in 2017. Through this collaboration, Tyson believes Antigua and Barbados will become a dominant player in tourism spaces once again.

“Absolutely, I think that with your association with Tyson Ranch that it would be a far good conclusion that we accomplish that and make this a powerhouse,” Tyson told reporters. “It will be good for the country and will bring in much-needed funds to help your economy.”

These plans and boasts aren’t just coming from Tyson’s team—the government of Antigua and Barbados are on board, too. Tyson met with Gaston Browne, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, earlier this September to discuss conceptualization of the project. According to Browne, the plans Tyson and his team are developing “goes beyond marijuana products or hemp products.”

“They are also looking at the whole area of entertainment and leisure and one of the most exciting projects that they will establish within the next nine months is the establishment of an annual marijuana conference here in Antigua,” Browne said at a press conference.

“It will be like the Davos of cannabis; it will take place on an annual basis and will bring stakeholders from throughout the globe for that matter right here on Antigua to discuss various opportunities within the industry.”