Canada’s successes with cannabis legalization should serve as a guide to foster the legalization of all drugs. The days of prohibition are numbered.

As a criminologist, I evaluate the success or failure of our experiment with cannabis legalization by the impact of this policy shift on criminal justice outcomes. From this perspective, legalization has been a resounding success.

In the two decades leading up to 2018, an average of almost 50,000 Canadians were arrested for cannabis possession (previously the most common drug offence in Canada) and many more for other cannabis-related crimes. While many of the possession charges would have been dropped or dealt with outside of the formal justice system, estimates for the number of Canadians saddled with criminal records for simple cannabis possession are as high as 500,000.

The consequences of criminalization are now well documented and include diminished educational and training opportunities, reduced employment and volunteering prospects, the denial of equal access to housing, social benefits, parental rights and restrictions on international travel. What sensible country would purposely deny these to its own people by criminalizing their cannabis use? Why shoot us in the foot?

As the Toronto Star has previously uncovered, the consequences of cannabis criminalization have also not been distributed evenly across the population. Both Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and then-cannabis czar Bill Blair noted the disproportionate impact that the enforcement of our cannabis laws has had on Indigenous, Black and other socially marginalized populations.

One cannot embrace reconciliation, or claim to be advancing anti-racist policies, when the very people those agendas are intended to benefit are being disadvantaged for engaging in a behaviour so common among the general population. Racist drug prohibition has no place in a just society.

Thankfully, legalization has brought with it a significant decrease in arrests for cannabis-related offences — just 1,378 for possession in 2020 (possession of unregulated cannabis and quantities over specified limits are still illegal). Smaller declines have also been observed for other offences, including the production and trafficking of cannabis.

This is very positive — it means that the criminal enterprise involved in bringing illegal cannabis to consumers faces reduced profits that would be used to fund other criminal endeavours.

On the flip side, there has been a significant increase in arrests for cannabis-impaired driving since legalization. This is again good news as fewer Canadians now report driving after having consumed cannabis than they did before legalization. This means that Canada’s strengthened impaired driving laws and greater resources given to police are resulting in higher rates of detection of the smaller pool of cannabis-impaired drivers.

There are a variety of other positives flowing from legalization. Legal recreational cannabis sales now outstrip illegal sales and a greater proportion of Canadians report getting their cannabis from legal (read: regulated) sources.

Cannabis legalization has also been a boon for the Canadian economy. The legal cannabis industry has created 98,000 jobs, contributed $43.5 billion to Canada’s GDP and channelled $15.1 billion to government coffers.

These positives flow in, while evidence suggests that key areas of concern, namely increased rates of cannabis consumption, have not materialized. Cannabis use among youth and adults remain close to their pro-legalization levels, although we should continue to monitor these trends.

Not only does cannabis legalization in Canada provide an example for other jurisdictions to follow (and many have — Georgia, Malta, Mexico, South Africa, and numerous American states have legalized since we did), but our approach to legalizing cannabis (measured and thought-out) should provide a template to usher in the legalization of other currently illegal substances.

Cannabis is just a first step. Psychedelics (magic mushrooms, LSD, DMT), will likely be next, with others to follow.

The increasing provision of psychedelics for medical purposes and ongoing decriminalization efforts promoted by a toxic drug supply and overdose crisis in Canada and elsewhere are clear signs of change.

And readers need not feel unease at what might seem like an even more drastic policy shift — drug prohibition is the anomaly, not the other way around. For most of human history, drugs have been legal.

Recreational cannabis legalization in 2018 raised great hopes for many Canadians. At that time, I wrote that it would succeed only if the government seized the moment in pursuing a truly public health approach.

Big hopes included curtailing illegal activity and ensuing ills of criminalization, educational opportunities to minimize cannabis use disorders and moving users away from smoking cannabis to safer modes of consumption. Some hoped replacing alcohol, tobacco and opioid use with responsible cannabis use would yield a net public health gain. And there was hope that policies restricting advertising would limit, or even decrease, problematic cannabis consumption, especially by young people.

I don’t dispute that there are some positives from legalization, but these small gains a success do not make. There are many signs that recreational cannabis legalization in Canada is not succeeding. Positives are not being realized sufficiently and there are growing indications of negative effects.

After four years, having 42 per cent of consumers still purchasing in the illicit market means that many remain at risk of being criminalized and are working with criminal elements involved in marketeering of illicit substances and weapons. I have been told that in some places it is now more profitable to deal in illicit cannabis than illicit tobacco.

Smoking is still by far the most prevalent mode of consuming cannabis despite the weight of evidence about the harms of cannabis smoke. Seventeen per cent of Canadians report being exposed to second-hand cannabis smoke in their homes. Who hasn’t frequently experienced the telling smell when walking the streets of our cities? Why is government still pushing dry flower used primarily for smoking in its own distribution networks? Where is the public education that is needed to teach users not to smoke?

Daily, or almost daily, cannabis use is a sensitive indicator of problem use potentially leading to the need for treatment. Among cannabis users, daily or almost daily use remains high: 20 per cent among 16 to 19 years; 29 per cent among 20 to 24 years; and 26 per cent for those older than 25.

Problem use appears to be on the rise. In Ontario, the percentage of people reporting moderate to high risk of cannabis problems increased from 13 to 17 per cent in 2020. More than half of all cannabis users reported moderate to high-risk cannabis problems — up three per cent from 2019.

While the effects of problematic cannabis use on health care utilization is not yet clear, there are warning signs. Prior to legalization there were some 30,000 instances of cannabis use disorder treatment in Canada. Analysis of Ontario data suggests that since legalization there has been no significant change in cannabis associated health care utilization. Anecdotal reports suggest that Ontario’s largest addiction hospital (CAMH) is being inundated with patients suffering from cannabis use challenges.

Much more education and training is needed to guide people to responsible, low-risk cannabis use. A 2020 survey found that more than half of cannabis users were not aware that daily or almost daily use increases risk of mental health problems. Among people who had used cannabis in the past 12 months, 21 per cent reported, in 2021, that they had driven within two hours of smoking or vaping cannabis.

These are worrying signs. Education and training, it was hoped, would help to prevent this type of problem. Where are the restrictions needed on THC concentrations that could help with this? Where are the graphic warning labels that could make a difference? Where is the requirement for cannabis vendors to orally explain the risks of excessive use to customers?

The government’s public health approach includes fairly tough regulation of cannabis promotion, but how successful are the restrictions? One very effective way cannabis companies are getting around restrictions is through brick-and-mortar cannabis stores. Across Ontario, there are now well over 1,000. In some parts of Toronto, there seems to be at least one on every block. What better way to gain exposure when traditional advertising channels are not available?

Cannabis companies are certainly not neglecting online promotion either. A recent article in JAMA Network Open found that 211 licensed cannabis companies in Canada have online platforms. Of these, 86 per cent violated the cannabis promotion restrictions, primarily by brand glamourization, failing to have age restrictions and risk information.

No. Cannabis legalization in Canada cannot be considered a success. We can and must do better.