In Colorado, where the U.S. experiment with legal recreational marijuana began a decade ago, a team of federal scientists has been paying regular cannabis users to get stoned. The unconventional line of research — which includes vans outfitted with hippie tapestries and a sleek car simulator — is tackling what safety experts regard as a major blind spot as marijuana use grows. Law enforcement officials lack tools to detect cannabis-impaired driving as reliably as they can identify people who get behind the wheel drunk, reports the New York Times. Only a few states routinely test the blood of drivers involved in serious accidents for marijuana, so little is known about how cannabis use is affecting road safety. Police officers generally need a warrant to compel a driver suspected of being impaired to provide a blood sample.
Even when blood samples are analyzed, tests cannot reliably establish whether a person last used marijuana hours or days before an accident, making the tests an imprecise gauge of impairment. State laws on cannabis-impaired driving are inconsistent and confusing, which has made them difficult for the police to enforce and for motorists to understand. “We’re kind of painting the plane as we fly it when it comes to cannabis liberalization,” said Jake Nelson of AAA, the automobile drivers group, which opposes the legalization of recreational cannabis. “Public health and safety has been more of an afterthought.” National data on the effects of marijuana use on road safety is spotty, but studies have shown that cannabis can impede a driver’s ability to respond quickly to an obstacle and judge distance accurately. In Colorado, the federal scientists are pursuing studies they hope will help policymakers craft sensible, enforceable standards. They are working to design portable breathalyzers that come closer to establishing how recently a driver used marijuana. Observing stoned drivers using a car simulator, they hope to more clearly understand how, and at what levels, cannabis impairs motor skills and reflexes of both habitual and occasional users.
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