As older adults increasingly use cannabis, researchers find higher health risks

As cannabis use among older adults climbs with more states, including Ohio, legalizing recreational use, researchers are finding more evidence of potential harm (Source: “As Cannabis Users Age, Health Risks Appear To Grow,” Kaiser Health News, June 9).
 
In an analysis of national survey data published June 2 in the medical journal JAMA, researchers reported that “current” cannabis use (defined as use within the previous month) had jumped among adults age 65 or older to 7% of respondents in 2023, from 4.8% in 2021. In 2005, he pointed out, fewer than 1% of older adults reported using cannabis in the previous year.
 
A wave of recent research points to reasons for concern for older users, with cannabis-related emergency room visits and hospitalizations rising, and a Canadian study finding an association between such acute care and subsequent dementia. Older people are more apt than younger ones to try cannabis for therapeutic reasons: to relieve chronic pain, insomnia, or mental health issues, though evidence of its effectiveness in addressing those conditions remains thin, experts said.
 
Studies in the United States and Canada, which legalized nonmedical cannabis use for adults nationally in 2018, show climbing rates of cannabis-related health care use among older people, both in outpatient settings and in hospitals.
 
In California, for instance, cannabis-related emergency room visits by those 65 or older rose, to 395 per 100,000 visits in 2019 from about 21 in 2005. In Ontario, acute care (meaning emergency visits or hospital admissions) resulting from cannabis use increased fivefold in middle-aged adults from 2008 to 2021, and more than 26 times among those 65 and up.