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That is a very important, and often, underconsidered point. In addition to the thing you mentioned about giving your immune system a head start, I would also imagine the pathology cause by the resulting inflammation (in response to high dose virus) would by much more severe, and would manifest much quicker. Both specialized immune cells and non immune cells (ie epithelial cells) have mechanisms of detecting viral infection within themselves and can trigger pathways that lead to release of molecules that promote inflammation (cytokines). If sustained this can by highly hazardous to tissue health and function. So I would imagine being exposed to high dose virus vs low dose virus would even have enormous implications independant of the adaptive immune response trying to control the virus.

Also, as you could imagine, this is really difficult to test clinically in humans (cause ethics and all that).

As you alluded to, the amount of thc in your system doesn't correlate to impairment. This is because thc stays in your system for a while and regular users can become tolerant. So it's difficult to determine whether someone who has thc in their system is actually impaired. It's fucked and really sucks for people in industries that drug test. I hope a better measure of impairment is discovered in the near future.

It differs from province to province. I don't know the exact numbers for taxes cause it's factored into the sale price at the store but IIRC it's around $1/gram tax + a general sales tax (5-15% depending on the province).

Its fully legalized federally, not just decriminalized. Though municipalities can set their own laws on consumption. For example some cities ban public consumption unless you have a prescription. In these places, private consumption is still allowed of course but if you don't own property and your landlords are shitty you're kinda fucked. Especially if it's a small town and the cops are assholes.

For growing, again it depends on the province. Some ban it outright, others like Alberta allow 4 plants/household. Only recently has there been legal avenues to acquiring seeds though.

The feds launched a program last year to grant pardons for simple possession but apparently only 257/10000+ people have received them. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/cannabis-record-suspension-pardon-pot-1.5678144

On a separate note, the recreational cannabis market is kinda shit. I mean I really can't complain and am grateful it's legal here but quality doesn't even come close to the black/grey market. It's also a lot more expensive (up to $15/g compared to $7-8 in the black/grey market). There does appear to be some downward pressure though. Edibles here are a joke though as the feds put a max 10mg thc limit on all edibles. Concentrates are decent though are hard to find and the market is dominated by thc vapes that I don't trust. Again though, I'm just happy it's legal and the prescription market has far better prices.

Afaik Canada doesn't have private prisons so I don't think it's comparible to the US. I'm sure politics play a role in these inefficiencies, but I feel that the major bottleneck is your typical government beaurocrats slowing everything down (seemingly just because they can). This was the case throughout the legalization phase.

I'm a molecular biologist. There are some studies that show cannabis extracts reduce the expression of Ace2 (the receptor for the SARS-CoV-2 virus) in cell culture models. https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202004.0315/v1 But there are a number of flaws with their model and their conclusions that cannabis consumption can be beneficial for people exposed to the virus is not really backed up by their data.

One of the more recognized features of covid 19 is cytokine storm. Basically the immune system loses its shit and goes into overdrive. This a nice review on how cannabinoids could reduce/modulate this process https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7187842/ but again, there is no solid clinical data supporting the idea cannabis could benefit people with covid. And I usually hate clinical science so that says a lot.