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A recent article in The Nation—and a growing chorus of similar commentary—argues that Thailand’s brief experiment with cannabis liberalization has produced troubling results. We are told that hospitalizations are up, that social harms are emerging, and that the logical conclusion is to return cannabis to narcotic status. The argument kind of sounds persuasive on the surface. It feels grounded in concern, responsibility, and public health. But scratch just a bit deeper, and the conclusion begins to unravel.
Let me be clear from the outset: I do not deny that cannabis-related issues exist. I do not deny that there have been hospital visits tied to intoxication, misuse, or just inexperienced panic. Of course there have. When something moves from the shadows into the open—when millions gain access to a substance that was once criminalized—we should expect the numbers to move.
But to say the numbers are increasing is not the same thing as saying they are meaningfully large. And that is the critical distinction being lost in this poor monologue disguised as a “debate”.
Cannabis use in Thailand has objectively increased. Surveys show past-year use rising from roughly 2.2% of the population in 2019 to over 4% in 2021 even before full liberalization. Since legalization, participation has expanded further. From a purely statistical standpoint, if more people are using cannabis, it follows that more people will occasionally misuse it. That is not evidence of a societal crisis—it is evidence of scale. What matters is proportionality. How many hospitalizations are occurring relative to total usage? How severe are these cases? What are the long-term outcomes?
And here, the available evidence does not support the narrative of widespread harm. Studies examining cannabis-related hospitalizations in Thailand show increases in reporting, but fail to establish clear, large-scale public health impacts or strong causal links to broader systemic issues. In other words, what we are seeing looks far less like a growing crisis and far more like increased visibility in a newly legal environment.
Perspective becomes even more important when we compare cannabis to substances that Thai society has long normalized. Thailand faces over 400,000 deaths annually from non-communicable diseases—conditions heavily driven by lifestyle factors including smoking and alcohol consumption. On a global scale, alcohol and tobacco are consistently ranked as far more harmful than cannabis in terms of mortality, dependence, and societal damage. These are not marginal differences. These are orders of magnitude. Yet cannabis is now being positioned as the substance that threatens Thai society?
It raises an uncomfortable question: Are we evaluating risk objectively, or emotionally? To put it more bluntly, if cannabis is a “problem,” then what language do we reserve for alcohol and tobacco? If we are truly guided by public health, should we not start where the harm is greatest?
Instead, we seem to be focusing on what is newest, most visible, and perhaps most unfamiliar.
Let me offer an analogy that may sound a bit silly until you consider it carefully. Every year, people in Thailand are hospitalized due to excessive durian consumption (by way of disclosure I am prone to consuming durian to excess). Too much sugar, too much richness, too much enthusiasm. We do not ban durian. We do not criminalize durian farmers. We do not raid orchards or imprison vendors. We accept that durian, like many things, carries risk when abused—but is manageable, cultural, and fundamentally benign when approached responsibly. Cannabis, viewed honestly, sits much closer to that category than the one it previously occupied as a narcotic.
There is another piece of this story that receives far too little attention. When cannabis was removed from the narcotics list, more than 3,000 individuals imprisoned solely for cannabis-related offenses were released from Thai prisons, with over 4,000 eligible for release nationwide. These individuals—growers, small operators, users—returned to their communities.
Where is the evidence that they destabilized society?
Where is the surge in crime tied to their release?
It does not exist. Instead, they returned to their families, resumed normal lives, and quietly reintegrated into society without incident.
This matters, because calls to recriminalize cannabis are not abstract policy debates. They have immediate human consequences. Recriminalization would not merely “control” cannabis—it would overnight create a new class of criminals out of people who are currently operating legally. Farmers, shop owners, workers, and consumers would once again face the threat of arrest—not because their behavior has changed, but because the law has.
We know where that road leads. We have already walked it. It leads to underground markets, diminished transparency, increased enforcement costs, and a strain on police and judicial systems. It shifts focus away from education and regulation and back toward punishment and avoidance. It incentivizes secrecy over safety. And perhaps most importantly, it erodes trust.
None of this is to suggest that cannabis should be void of responsible guardrails and regulations. But the appropriate response is appropriate regulation which reflects reality not perception and not the ongoing cynical abuse of statistics to intentionally put forth a false narrative and frighten consumers of media (I would argue that consumption of false media is far more dangerous that consumption of cannabis).
There is also a broader concern lurking beneath the surface of this debate. The narrative surrounding cannabis has always taken on a tone that feels disproportionate to the evidence. Isolated incidents are elevated into trends. Limited data points are presented without context. And conclusions are drawn that far exceed what the numbers actually support.
It is hard not to wonder whether some of this narrative is being shaped by interests beyond pure public health—whether economic displacement, social positioning, or simple discomfort with change are playing a role in how the story is being told. That does not invalidate the concerns being raised. But it does require us to approach them with a critical eye.
Thailand has already taken a significant step forward. Legalization brought cannabis out of the shadows. It allowed for visibility, accountability, and the beginnings of a regulated ecosystem. It empowered local growers and sparked a domestic industry rooted in Thai agriculture and culture. To reverse course now would not restore order—it would dismantle progress.
As has been observed elsewhere, criminalization does not eliminate demand. It simply pushes supply into less visible, less accountable channels. We risk recreating a system where consumers have less information, fewer protections, and no meaningful recourse. The conversation we should be having is not whether cannabis should once again become illegal. That question misunderstands both the data and the reality on the ground.
The real question is how to manage something that is clearly here to stay one way or the other.
If we approach that question with honesty, proportionality, and a commitment to evidence over perception, the answer becomes clear: cannabis in Thailand is not a societal threat requiring strict regulatory application. It is a manageable issue requiring thoughtful proportionate regulation which focuses on real risks (quality and pesticides and general lack of education). Policy built on that distinction will serve Thailand far better than one built on fear and media manipulation.
