Skip to main content

Why do Nordic countries hate cannabis so much?

For some reason that I don't really understand (I haven't researched the history of this), the Nordic Countries in particular, or rather, their governments, seem to have a particularly deep hatred of cannabis, over all drugs.

In most if not all Nordic Countries you can get a longer jail sentence for growing cannabis for your personal use than selling hard drugs (like heroin, cocaine or meth) to people. In fact, you can get a longer jail sentence than purposefully killing someone. You think I'm exaggerating or kidding, or that this is just some kind of metaphor? Nope, it's literally true. In several if not all of the Nordic countries the judicial system routinely gives shorter jail sentences for manslaughter, even murder, than for growing cannabis for your own personal use. And much, much longer than eg. selling heroin on the streets.

In some of the countries the medical use of cannabis is recognized, but it's extremely restricted and regulated.

Note that "medical cannabis" here is not just weed that you smoke. It's cannabis extract in the form of pills that you swallow. They have a significantly milder intoxicating effect than smoked cannabis, but it's about equally effective to combat pain. You might get slightly dizzy from the first few pills you take, but your body quite quickly gets used to it, and after the first few you don't really feel it at all. Other than the pain relieving effect, that is.

Well, can you guess how regulated and restricted medical cannabis extract in the form of pills is eg. in Finland? Medical doctors need to request an individual single-use license for each individual prescription (which consists of one single pack of pills) from the police, and the police only grants a very small amount of such single-use licenses. That's right: Every time a doctor wants to prescribe cannabis extract pills to a patient, he needs to have had to make a request to the police for each individual prescription, and one prescription is one box of pills, no more. And the police will grant only a handful of licenses at a time.

On top of that, doctors who prescribe medical cannabis to their patients tend to get a really bad reputation among the rest of the medical community, and about the only way they can have a job after that is to have a personal private practice. They will usually be shunned from ever getting a job at a larger private clinic or even the public healthcare system.

And mind you, these cannabis pills cause very little or no addiction whatsoever. And the medical community knows this.

What's most egregious about this is that, at the same time, medical doctors are completely free to prescribe extremely strong, and extremely addictive, opioid-based pain medication, with little to no restrictions or regulation, or loss of reputation. They can write you an opioid-based medication prescription just like that. And many of these medications can have devastating effects, both immediate (eg. in terms of cognitive abilities, which stops you from eg. being able to drive or operate heavy machinery) and long-term (potentially causing very strong addiction).

It's widely recognized that cannabis extract pills are much more effective at treating many forms of chronic pain with very few side effects and very small risk of addiction, while strong opioid-based pain medication can have very strong side effects and a much, much higher risk of severe addiction. Yet, for some reason, the former is significantly more regulated and restricted than the latter.

And, as mentioned, the punishment for manufacturing cannabis, even if it's just for your own personal use, is completely out of proportion, surpassing drug dealing and even outright murder, and that's no exaggeration.

I'm not saying that cannabis should be fully legalized and unregulated in all of its forms. What I am saying is that this completely irrational hatred should stop. It makes absolutely no sense. The legal punishment and restrictions are in no way proportional to the severity of the crimes. When you get shorter jail sentences for murder than for growing cannabis for yourself, something is very, very wrong.

Comments