GBH Daily: That reefer madness study

☁️Cloudy but no longer rainy, with highs in the 60s. Sunset is at 6:29 p.m.

Let’s start with a deeper look at a study on older adults who use marijuana: About 8.9% of people 65 and older surveyed by researchers from the University of California San Diego School of Medicine said they used cannabis in the last year, and researchers said 11.4% of them met the criteria for cannabis use disorder.

So what does that mean? Cannabis use disorder is a condition described in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (also called the DSM-5), the American Psychiatric Association’s manual of mental health conditions and their characteristics. To qualify for a diagnosis of mild cannabis use disorder, a person must meet two or more of 11 possible criteria. Those criteria include more serious issues, like having health problems or giving up important activities because of cannabis use. But: the two most common criteria met in this study were spending time obtaining, using and recovering from using cannabis (74% of people surveyed) and craving cannabis (67.5% of participants.)

“A lot of seniors are using cannabis really helpfully with great benefit for disorders such as pain, anxiety, insomnia [and] weight loss,” Dr. Peter Grinspoon, an addiction specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital, told GBH’s Diane Adame.

Basically, if the use of any substance is causing problems in your life or the life of someone you know, it’s often a good idea to talk to a medical professional about it. And if you are an older adult who uses cannabis, tell your doctor about it and ask about potential interactions with other medications you’re taking.

Dr. Scott Hadland, an addiction physician at Mass General Brigham, told Adame that the rates of cannabis use disorder found in older adults are actually lower than those in the general population. However, he still sees some cause for concern. “This is a group that often goes overlooked and whose cannabis use might not necessarily be addressed by clinicians who think, ‘this is someone who’s older, and let’s let them make their choices towards the end of their lifespan.’” You can read Adame’s full report here.

Four Things to Know

1. Recall on the table in Lawrence: Lawrence Mayor Brian DePeña is now facing criminal charges in both state and federal courts, accused of fraud involving pandemic-relief funds and of illegally recording employees at City Hall.

Now city councilors are talking about possibly removing him from office, though they have not begun the formal process for a recall. “Lawrence could be in the news for true positive things happening in the city,” said Jessica Andors, executive director of Lawrence CommunityWorks. “For things such as new housing, successful youth programs and vibrant business and arts communities. It is a shame we’re in the news for this.”

2. Cape’s soggy weekend: Camp Edwards at Joint Base Cape Cod got 7.1 inches of rain over the weekend, according to the National Weather Service. That’s about twice the area’s monthly average rainfall for this time of year, all in one weekend. The Weather Service has a map of rainfall totals across the state here. 

The rainy, windy weekend meant slower business for local farmers who depend on people going apple picking for some of their fall income, GBH Meteorologist Dave Epstein said. He suggested finding a farm near you as the rain clears and the temperatures rise this week.

3. Gray clouds’ silver linings: A bit of good news from the weekend’s storms: because the rain didn’t come down too fast and furious, it will likely help the state’s drought conditions. Extremely heavy rain often causes flooding and flows into rivers and oceans before it can soak into aquifers. But slower, steadier rain has time to seep into the ground.

“That’s the type of rain we want to see because that’s the rain that’ll soak into the ground, will get into our streams, will make sure the groundwater starts to replenish. And in general, it’s good for the whole hydrological system,” said Vandana Rao, the state’s director of water policy.

4. Ready, set, Celtics: The C’s preseason games begin Oct. 8, with the regular season starting Oct. 20. Two of those preseason games will be against the Philadelphia 76ers, now home to longtime Celtic Jaylen Brown after Boston traded him this summer following nine seasons with the team.

Forward-guard Jayson Tatum said saying goodbye to Brown, with whom he played for nine years, is part of the business of the game. His new teammate Paul George is someone he grew up watching: “I would always try to steal things from [him] and watch what he was doing,” Tatum said.

Mass. launched a program to stop school sports bullying. Why are so few schools using it?

Coach Jerome Edgerton Jr. remembers a basketball game from March 2024: The Pittsfield boys’ basketball team was playing at Worcester State University. A player from the opposing team spit on one of Edgerton’s players, a guard who is Black. Other people made racist comments as the players left the court.

“It was really degrading to us … just a nasty situation,” Edgerton told GBH’s Chris Burrell, a reporter with the GBH Center for Investigative Reporting. “Being bullied for what you look like. It just piles on to the trauma that some of these kids come from [and] has a profound impact on how they think about themselves.”

Four years ago, state officials decided bullying in school sports was a big enough problem that it merited a program to address it: Addressing Hate in School Sports. The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association built a website through which schools can report bullying and hate incidents. But those cases haven’t been made public.

“MIAA has been falling asleep at the wheel while students suffer due to a significant spike in the number of racial harassment and bullying incidents,” Iván Espinoza-Madrigal, executive director of Lawyers for Civil Rights in Boston, told Burrell. “Without a functioning MIAA that is actually willing to call foul when students are being harassed, intimidated and bullied, on and off the field, all students remain vulnerable.”

You can find the full investigation into bullying and hate in school sports here. 

Dig deeper: 

-‘Let Jason’s story not be in vain’: The growing push to toughen Mass. anti-bullying law

-Father and son file lawsuit claiming school bullying on Cape Cod linked to suicide attempt

-Latino, Black students more likely to face bullying, mental health issues, says MassInc poll