Legal Weed Has Led To An Explosion In a (Formerly) Rare Condition

Cannabis Hyperemesis Syndrome cases have risen 300-fold in less than 20 years.

Whenever you see a headline that says something is “on the rise”, there are basically two possibilities. One, the thing is actually on the rise — like pickleball.

The other possibility is that we’re capturing the information differently nowadays — either we are getting better at measuring something that has always been common (autism spectrum disorder may fall in this category, at least for part of the observed increase) or we are measuring that thing worse with more false positives driving up the observed rate, like UFO sightings: ubiquitous phone cameras mean every little bit of swamp gas from a weather balloon trapped in a thermal pocket and reflecting the light from Venus gets recorded.

It’s the job of epidemiologists to figure out what is driving observed changes in our health, and this week I want to share some data that shows that the rate of a specific cannabis-associated problem is not just on the rise. It is absolutely skyrocketing. Let’s see if we can figure out why.