“Pediatric Death Due to Myocarditis After Exposure to Cannabis”

Advocates of marijuana reform are often quick to assert that nobody dies from an overdose of marijuana.  But this new clinical report from two Colorado doctors, which has the same title as this post, discusses a case of an 11-month child who may have died as a direct result of marijuana exposure.   The paper is authored by Thomas Nappe and Christopher Hoyte, and here is the paper’s abstract:

Since marijuana legalization, pediatric exposures to cannabis have increased.  To date, pediatric deaths from cannabis exposure have not been reported.  The authors report an 11-month-old male who, following cannabis exposure, presented with central nervous system depression after seizure, and progressed to cardiac arrest and died.  Myocarditis was diagnosed post-mortem and cannabis exposure was confirmed.  Given the temporal relationship of these two rare occurrences – cannabis exposure and sudden death secondary to myocarditis in an 11-month-old – as well as histological consistency with drug-induced myocarditis without confirmed alternate causes, and prior reported cases of cannabis-associated myocarditis, a possible relationship exists between cannabis exposure in this child and myocarditis leading to death. In areas where marijuana is commercially available or decriminalized, the authors urge clinicians to preventively counsel parents and to include cannabis exposure in the differential diagnosis of patients presenting with myocarditis.

UPDATE: Unsurprisingly, this clinical report links a death to marijuana exposure has created a stir, and this new Washington Post piece headlined “The truth behind the ‘first marijuana overdose death’” provides some context for the controversy.