Experts say the increase in people seeking treatment for marijuana addiction is due simply to the unprecedented potency and accessibility of weed. While there’s no comprehensive national data, attendance at San Francisco’s most popular Marijuana Anonymous meeting has tripled since 2019.

Chris Colwell, chief of emergency medicine at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, said the number of emergency room patients who come in with adverse symptoms from weed has increased tenfold since legalization in 2016. Before that, he said, the ER would see a few patients a week with cannabis-induced nausea, vomiting, or delusions. Now, he estimates, four or five come in every day.

Zach, like others in recovery, asked for his last name to be withheld to maintain his anonymity.