Researchers suggest that the combination of alcohol with marijuana leads to potential impairment results nearly twice as dangerous as the predicted danger of just one. This finding is the reason ALL national plans for social consumption clubs clearly forbid the serving of alcohol with cannabis use. And studies which utilize breath collection for THC metabolites measurement, are surging ahead of those older methods which have (unsuccessfully) sought to prove same-day consumption from analysis of bodily fluids (saliva/urine), from blood/plasma or from DNA samples like nails for hair.
Chart source: Is It Safe to Mix Alcohol & Marijuana? | The Recovery Village
in related news, chemical analysis in studies regarding THC presence in recent consumer consumption is measuring the impact with MJ “metabolites” and their interaction with other compounds related to THC.
risky behaviors beyond driving—
Colorado Dept of Transportation identifies these impacted outcomes:
- Slowed reaction time. (Hyper-vigilance — dangerously slow??)
- Loss of coordination and problem-solving skills.
- Distorted perception of time, distance and speed.
Even as Gen-Z consumer say they have cut down or eliminated their alcohol intake and replaced it with cannabis– older consumers continue to mix both pot(a stimulant) and booze(a depressant) — particularly as one substance tends to “mask” the intoxicating effect of the other. For instance, scientists find that consuming alcohol first opens the door to cannabis more efficiently saturating the _______– increasing the intensity of MJ effect. Conversely, consumption of MJ first tends to decrease the “perceived” intoxication of alcohol with users under-estimating their own drunkenness with the pot effect. Taken together, for traffic driving studies, researchers have estimated the combo of both drugs to be as high as 1.8 times more debilitating than use of either.
“One key question that we cannot yet answer is whether breath measurements can be used to distinguish between a person who uses cannabis regularly but hasn’t done so lately, and someone who consumed an hour ago,” said NIST supervisory chemical engineer and study author Tara Lovestead at the University of Colorado (link to paper:
. “Having a reproducible protocol for breath measurements will help us and other researchers answer that question.”
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