‘Scromiting’ Is Just ONE Adverse Effect 420 Legalization Activists Don’t Talk About

Activists agitating for removal of all barriers to pot smoking have been over-hyping the benefits and underselling the adverse effects.

‘Scromiting’ is a nasty one we’ll come back to, but there are other more mundane negative consequences as well.

A famous quote by Simone Weil comes to mind: “Imaginary evil is romantic and varied; real evil is gloomy, monotonous, barren, boring. Imaginary good is boring; real good is always new, marvelous, intoxicating.”

Canada has legalized us nationally. They already have studies showing that youth are not only among the highest per-capita pot users in the world, but that such use is landing them in the emergency room, per a study titled: Original quantitative research – The impact of recreational cannabis legalization on pediatric emergency department visits in British Columbia, Canada

Canadian youth report some of the highest rates of cannabis use globally, raising concerns about child and youth poisonings from unintentional exposures and recreational use following legalization. This study examines and compares trends in cannabis poisonings among children and youth aged 16 years or younger treated in the emergency department (ED) of a Canadian pediatric hospital before and after the legalization of non-medical cannabis.

But maybe the person you know who uses it medically does so to help with anxiety or depression. They might want to rethink that strategy:

A sweeping new analysis published in The Lancet Psychiatry challenges one of the fastest-growing trends in modern medicine: the use of cannabis-based treatments for mental health. After reviewing a vast body of clinical evidence, researchers found no reliable support for using medicinal cannabis to treat anxiety, depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
[…] Dr. Wilson said, “But the overall quality of evidence for these other conditions, such as autism and insomnia, was low. In the absence of robust medical or counseling support, the use of medicinal cannabis in these cases is rarely justified. — University of Sydney study

It gets worse. The study in Canada shows a strong link in the other direction, worsening anxiety and depression… and suicidal tendencies.

The study, led by McMaster University and published in The Canadian Journal of Psychiatry on Feb. 26, 2026, analyzed data from two large, nationally representative Statistics Canada surveys of Canadians aged 15 and older living in the provinces, to examine cannabis use and mental‑health outcomes between 2012 and 2022.

With the legalization of cannabis in Canada landing at the midpoint of the study period, the authors suggest that stronger products, wider availability and increased use for stress relief – may be contributing to the patterns they observed. The study doesn’t prove causation, but it underscores a widening public‑health issue as cannabis use and mental‑health challenges rise in parallel.

“We see that Canadians who use cannabis tend to be more likely to meet criteria for anxiety and depressive disorders, and more likely to report suicidality. We also see that this co-occurrence has strengthened over time,” said Jillian Halladay, an assistant professor in the School of Nursing at McMaster and youth substance use research lead at the Peter Boris Centre for Addictions Research, a joint collaboration between McMaster and St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton. — McMaster Study

What about more mundane questions like heart health? That’s in here too! There’s a category called ‘Major adverse cardiovascular events’. It’s an umbrella term that can include anything from the big issues like heart attacks and strokes all the way down to blocked arteries and angina.

Conclusions This systematic review and meta-analysis uses an original approach centred on real-world data. The findings reveal positive associations between cannabis use and MACE. These findings should encourage investigating cannabis use in all patients presenting with serious cardiovascular disorders.

If you’ve got a family history of heart issues, it’s probably in your best interests to step back from the bong. And you know how stoners have a reputation for a bad memory? Again it’s worse than we thought. Users can have ‘memories’ that never actually happened.

Most people think of cannabis as something that makes memories fuzzy. But new research suggests it can do something more surprising: make false memories feel real.

While cannabis is often associated with forgetfulness, a new study suggests that acute cannabis intoxication can also subtly distort memory, shaping not just what we recall, but how accurately we recall it. The findings expand on decades of research on cannabis and recall, pointing to a more complex effect on the brain’s memory systems.
[…] About 70 percent showed some level of impairment, including temporal order memory (remembering the sequence of events) and source memory (identifying where information came from). False memory and source memory showed the largest effect of cannabis. — National Geographic

Users under the age of 25 have a real risk of marijuana-induced psychosis, a persistent condition and break from reality that is different from a bad high, which is further explained in a handy chart here.

And we’ll let the NIH describe the joys of ‘scromiting’ unique to cannabis users:

Young people, typically between the age of 18–40 are presenting with frequent bouts of acute nausea, vomiting, and moderate to severe abdominal cramping.9 Patients present with the combination of screaming and loud vomiting, which has led to the term “scromiting”. Patients may report that their symptoms are temporarily relieved by hot showers. They may recurrently present to the ED. Many have had CTs, GI evaluations, and endoscopy. Testing results are usually negative. Endoscopy may show gastritis or esophagitis from the repeated vomiting […technical medical jargon about remedies and other symptoms/risks including liver failure…] Most patients refuse to believe that cause of their symptoms is cannabis products (traditional thoughts are that cannabis is the treatment for nausea and vomiting) and are very reluctant to stop using. The treatment of choice is abstinence for a prolonged period of time (typically over several weeks and sometimes, months).

That same ’emergent medical illnesses Related to Cannabis Use’ article went on to describe a case of a 16yo with psychosis, a catatonic patient who was initially thought to have had a stroke, and 3 young men between 19 and 23 with heart problems.

What’s worse than a buzz-kill?

Well, scromiting sounds like it might be worse. And that’s not even the worst adverse reaction on this list.