Farnsworth Says Pot Use Rising

Dr. Dana L. Farnsworth, director of University Health Services, testified against marijuana and marijuana proselytizers yesterday in Suffolk Superior Court.

As a witness for the prosecution, he told the court that marijuana was a "harmful and dangerous drug," that in large enough doses it induces psychoses, and that more and more people are using it in the Boston area.

On Wednesday, Dr. David C. Lewis, assistant in Medicine at Harvard had testified for the defense that there was no real evidence to prove that marijuana is dangerous.

Concrete Data

The pre-trial hearing, being held to determine whether state law controlling marijuana are constitutional, reached its next to last day with the lega profession stoil trying to get some concrete data from the medical.

Chief Justice G. Joseph Tauro commented "it would be very helpful from a judicial point of view to have positive evidence. After two weeks of trial, we have many spot checks but no solid statistics on the effects of marijuana."

Farnsworth said he believed that marijuana-smoking has become so wide-spread it constitutes a "very serious problem." He based his testimony on personal observations here and reports from other campuses.

Ten Per Cent "Tragic"

He provided no statistics, but he said people who use marijuana think everyone is using it, while those who don't think few do. He gave a percentage breakdown on different varities of marijuana users. Of these:

* 50 per cent try it out of curiosity; they have no serious emotional problems, and soon stop.

* About 40 per cent are persuaded by friends to try marijuana, use it for a time, but drop it when it starts to encroach on their academic life and work.

* 10 per cent (a category in my mind tragic," said Farnsworth) use the drug to postpone emotional problems, become totally dependent on it, and are headed for bigger drugs and mental institutions.

Farnsworth said that psychoses can be induced if the dosage of marijuana is large enough, or if the person is troubled enough when he takes it.

It is a "very distressing social phenomenon," he said, that users are a "most evangelical bunch" and urge friends to take marijuana as soon as they themselves start using it