You’re sick. Someone offers you marijuana, saying that it will alleviate your suffering. Do you take it? Many patients and doctors have insisted that marijuana is uniquely beneficial, while others say the dangers of cannabis far outweigh the benefits. We know that marijuana is a drug, but is it a medicine?
Its a right thing that marijuana is a drug but it also uses for the medicinal purposes like breast cancer. http://psychotropia.co/
The government spends billions of dollars on trying to keep marijuana on of the U.S. but yet physicians prescript it to patents with AIDS, glaucoma,arthritis, amelioration which cause's nausea and vomiting. Millions of Americans die from alcohol and tobacco products, they have no medical value yet it is legal.
Effecten van stoppen met roken De effecten van stoppen met roken zijn voor veel mensen vervelend: prikkelbaarheid, nervositeit, Effecten van stoppen met rokenslapeloosheid en transpiratie. Gelukkig heeft Prostop Therapie een unieke methode ontwikkeld waarmee u zonder deze negatieve effecten kunt stoppen met roken. Het geheim? Een speciaal ontwikkelde lasertherapie zodat uw lichaam snel geen behoefte aan nicotine meer heeft.
Many have heard present day testimonies of marijuana 's benefits to sufferers of chemotherapy, MS, glaucoma, etc., even cancer fighting abilities are being proven; however, cannabis has been used as medicine for thousands of years.
Cannabis was called a "superior herb" in the first medical textbook, China 2737 BC. Soma, aka as bhang (a mixture of cannabis flowers and leaves used in India) mentioned as "the king of the healing plants," in the Rig Veda - one of the oldest religious books, sacred to Hinduism and Buddhism.
Medicinal benefits of cannabis are being discovered and proven everyday.
i like the health insurance coverage Irving, they have nice health policies.
http://multiplehealthquotes.com
cannabis but have known friends who use it for assisting in their pain control. These people are not junkies or bums, each has worked in a productive position until injuries stopped them.
Our government has a long history of demonizing anything or anyone they want to discredit. We have spent billions on the drug war only to see smoke more popular than it was in the sixties. Looking back at the time when they started the push to make marijuana illegal it really seems to follow the pattern they use.
I think a lot of opinions here in America are formed after listening to radio and tv commercials than after really studying the situation and reaching an independent set of opinions and ideas.
As far as I'm aware marijuana isn't used 'raw' any more than coffee is. Marijuana is dried and cured before use so while I don't agree with this assertion it is worth pointing out that it is technically misleading.
What about that the FDA has approved Marinol-
The chief ingredient in Marinol is THC a.k.a. the active ingredient in marijuana -
Marinol "has been found to relieve the nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy for cancer patients and to assist with loss of appetite with AIDS patients." The DEA endorses this statement.
So..there is no proof that marijuana has any affect on relieving symptoms of any illness or disease, but the FDA and DEA find that TCH actually does when it goes by a different name? I call BS.
So..as long as pharma can corner the market and sell a bottle of 60 pills for 250-400 then it is ok. RIght?
my doctors tried all of the prescription drugs available to combat the nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy, and not one of them worked- even the one that cost me over $100 per pill after the insurance company paid their share. I started using marijuana when the last prescription failed, and it stopped the nausea and vomiting completely. Marinol is not effective in a LOT of patients- human cannabinoid receptors do discriminate between real and synthetic THC.
Israel now uses Cannabis to treat Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in its military. There is no other drug that comes close to its effectiveness.
Though marijuana may hold some value as a pain killer, it is very much dwarfed by such things as morphine. It is important to note though, that there are more carcinogens found in marijuana than tobacco. Though it may be used for pain purposes, it does not eqaute to it being a medicine.
I know from experience that there is no better treatment for the symptoms associated with chronic gastro-intestinal conditions such as Crohn's Disease, or ulcerative colitis. It not only acts as a pain-killer, but also as an anti-nauseant and anti-depressant, valuable effects when a patient is unable to eat for days on end during bad flare ups, or during the onset of the disease. While there clearly are risks to smoking anything (it goes against reason that inhaling smoke can be only beneficial), the long term risks from cannabis are far less than the possible long term risks of, say, morphine. Assuming that both are equally addictive, (they aren't, morphine is much more addictive than cannabis), and that a patient is likely to become addicted during treatment, we can safely say that the long term risks of morphine, such as liver failure, brain damage, and bodily decay are much worse, and onset much more quickly.
It should also be noted that morphine has been regulated longer than cannabis, and carries far higher penalties for possession in narcotics laws because it is much more dangerous. Just because doctors prescribe it for patients doesn't make it a better option than cannabis. Doctors sometimes use a liquid cocaine compound to treat nosebleeds, yet that too is a far more dangerous, and evidently destructive drug with great, immediate, risk.
The sensible thing to do is offer it as an alternative to consenting adults who understand the risk involved; it's always easier and cheaper to allow people freedom than to actively take it away.
P.S. The healthful benefits of THC can easily be gained without smoking anything, so the carcinogen argument is a bit of a non-starter, too.
Google Tashkin+cancer.
Google THC+glioma.
The 25% reduction in my intraoccular pressure is a documented fact.
It has been a medicine since before recorded history.
Google "W.B. O'Shaughnessy."
"Add possible increased risk of heart disease to the side effects of smoking marijuana. A study led by Jean Lud Cadet of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Md., and published online in Molecular Psychiatry tested blood samples from 18 chronic marijuana users and 24 nonusers. Heavy smokers, who used 78 to 350 joints a week, had higher levels of the protein apolipoprotein C-Ill, which stops enzymes from chewing up triglycerides. This failure increases the levels of triglycerides, implicated in heart disease. Chronic use may boost levels of the protein when THC, marijuana's active ingredient, binds to cannabinoid receptors in the liver, says George Kunos of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism in Bethesda. The body also makes substances that bind to the receptors. Understanding how THC works can shed light on this natural pathway, Kunos adds."
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"The effects of marijuana are mediated by cannabinoid receptors on neurons in the brain, and a causal relationship between marijuana use during pregnancy and permanent cognitive deficits in the offspring has been identified. Berghuis et al. (p. 1212) now define the molecular hierarchy that controls marijuana actions within single neurons and show that activation of cannabinoid receptors by their natural ligands controls the establishment of functional connections between neurons in the brain. These findings define the cellular context through which prenatal marijuana use perturbs brain development.
CREDIT: BERGHUIS ET AL."
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/sci ;316/5828/1093h?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=marijuana&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
May is a big word to hook all that danger warning too. Eating too much steak MAY cause your cholesterol to go up too high and cause the same problem chronic marijuana use MAY. Get a
life,teach your own children the values you hold dear and quit blaming everyone else because they come out like everyone else's children.
who can smoke 78-350 joints in a week? that's 11-50 joints a day... a chronic smoker might hit 5-6 a day, but 11-50?? your numbers are insane
Well, I know someone who does manage to smoke close to 50 joints a day. She doesn't smoke tobacco , but perhaps it's similar usage to those who have a 2 pack a day tobacco habit.
She's also monstrously overweight (attibutes it to the "munchies" she says always come with smoking "dope" - her words).
So even if cannabis isn't directly affecting her current poor state of health (she has many problems related to obesity ), if her own admitted connection between over-eating and cannbis is correct, then there are certainly secondary health issues resulting from cannabis use in her case.
I will agree with you, that that is a rather high figure. However, I feel that there are several things that should not be ignored.
1. That "smoking" may have been just a label that they may have branded overall marijuana use. They could have easily thrown in figures such as "ingesting so much marijuana is eqaul to smoking this many joints" (my example is rather crude, but I think that you get the point).
2. You are forgetting that there are indeed outliers in all communities. Someone is found to always be around a large amount of marijuana burning could be eqauted to so many joints being individually used. Similar to a hookah bar server being around so much second hand smoke. They could eqaute that to individually using so many tobacco products.
3. This particular statement I am not overly confident in, but nonetheless, it is from a reliable source. Now, I am not saying that they are correct a hundred percent of the time, but I am saying that they most likely would have checked this study before putting it under their name.
http://www.opposingviews.com/articles/research-moderate-long-term-marijuana-use-reduces-risk-of-some-cancer
Not the first that I have heard about MJ and the effects on cancer .
Cannabis has been around for 5000 years and has proved it's efficacy as a medicinal herb, simply by it's longevity of useage. If it's really as harmful as the drug-war propagandists insist it is, surely we, as logical reasoning human beings would have eradicated it long before now ??
But no, we have used this precious plant over the centuries, for pleasure, for clothing,ropes for the sailing ships, buildings, for so many diverse benefits, without any need for bio-ecology destructurage.
I sincerely believe that there are many more beneficial effects still to be discovered within the chromosomes of this lovely genus of plant..but separation of the THC from the other chemical compounds will not necessarily preclude side effects. This herb is best smoked in it's original state of being..
Thousands of people, nay, millions of people would testify to the healing powers of marijuana had they not been subjected to the propagandist film made in 1938, in which marijuana users were portrayed as manic killers..and the drug-wars began. People who had previously smoked the herb to help them through what were extremely difficult days began to feel ostracised and consequently had to resort to illegal purchase of their "medicine"...and it's much the same nowadays.
Remember, up until 1938, cannabis sativa was available from any reputable herb shop and anyone who has read A Modern Herbal by Mrs Grieve will know the properties with which the herb was attributed. In my opinion, any natural product, I mean plant or weed, which has been around for as long as Cannabis has, deserves great respect and should be classified as an empiric medicine.
Relief from pain and nausea are only two of the medical benefits of marijuana. In 1974, a study in Virginia found that it blocks tumor growth. U.S. officials suppressed this information. Subsequent research in Spain confirmed that marijuana shrinks brain tumors. And a twenty-year population study by UCLA has concluded that smoking marijuana does not cause lung cancer. These tumor-shrinking, anti-carcinogenic properties have also been found effective against prostate and non-melanoma skin cancers. Recent research in Canada indicates that, unlike caffine, alcohol or opiates, marijuana actually encourages brain cell growth. And an Italian study on pain relief finds it superior to synthetic, non-synergistic, patented cannabinoids like Marinol. If these reports were aired on the NBC Nightly News, we'd see zillions of Marlboro Men screaming for reform. The public is already ahead of the politicians on this issue. Elected officials are too afraid of being labeled 'soft on crime'. What say the Michigan voters?
I you are a grown American citizen and you feel weed helps with your mental or physical problems that is good enough for me. Why should I or my government insist on putting you in jail for seeking your personal relief? Greed they want to make sure the PAC checks clears. We are sacrificed, our lives ruined, and our rights are taken away for pure greed! The so called legal drug companies estimate 80% loss if weed were legal it would replace many of the drugs they push (legally). They spend millions in PAC (political action committee) money to ensure our so called leaders vote to keep a god given weed illegal and continue to enslave us to protect corporate profits. Stop federal oppression vote for Obama!!
Cherokee Fred Hussein aka Stupid old man
Yes, marijuana is an herbal medicine. The fraud of cannabis prohibition should not be blamed on religious people. A lot of religious people use herbs for healing help. The " love of money" has prolonged cannabis prohibition because drug companies and law enforcement stand to lose money if it is legalized. Alcohol companies are worried that it might cut into their sales too.
Smoking any substance, whether it be tobacco, cannabis, or tree bark, is very bad for health. However, marijuana has been proven time and time again to help alleviate pain from a number of different causes. Marijuana in pill form has the same effects as the inhalation of it's smoke, so why not make it accessible that way?
I am a registered nurse that was taught 15 years ago in nursing school that marijuana can help alleviate the nausea that frequently accompanies cancer and AIDS. I had depression long ago, and marijuana helped me not commit suicide. A few years back, I got stuck with a needle that had been used to administer a shot to a person that could easily been infected with HIV/AIDS. The treatment for such a situation is treatment with HIV drugs within two hours of the stick, and for at least 6 weeks after the stick. Those drugs made me terribly nauseated, on the verge of vomiting constantly. Marinol helped, but my physician told me to smoke marijuana as well. The combination lessened the nausea enough to stop the vomiting. Recently I have been diagnosed with Abdominal Migraines, Colitis, Crohn's, and Diverticulosis. Obtaining a license to do so, I began to smoke marijuana. It has really helped with the nausea and to keep my stress level down. I also believe it has helped to lessen the bleeding from the diverticulosis.
So please think twice before you condemn this drug. It has very few negative side effects other than affecting your lungs like any smoke would do. I was a waitress when my state first began it's big push against marijuana. My customers stopped asking if I could find pot for them, and started trying to find ice and crack. The state was the "gateway" in this instance, not pot.
My gastroenterologist tells me that well over 25% of her caseload are addicted to prescription pain killers like oxycodone. That something is prescribed doesn't make the user any less of an addict.
Our country was founded by men that realized that we needed to engineer our laws so that the fewest number of people would be impacted by them. Our nation is diverse, with many diverse opinions. We need to open our minds and evaluate everything with an educated, unbiased attitude. It is what our forefathers showed us how to do. They would not be pleased with our need to control others.
Laws against Marijuana and Hemp were racist in their origins and only serve those who would profit from prohibition. true Crimes don't leave an oder trail or scent. Rick Simpson has cured over 1000 people with his cannabis oil. It's time people come before corporate and organized crime profits. Stop wasting our taxdollars on arresting people for using a seed bearing plant placed here on Earth by God for all to benefit from. www.jackherer.com http://www.phoenixtears.ca /
The "Great Manipulation" is one wrought by those who would keep cannabis illegal, not by those trying to get a very effective medicine into the hands of suffering patients. It is ever thus, that we attribute to others those qualities which we ourselves possess, but that is another story. It is quite true that those who object most strenuously to cannabis as medicine are afraid that the house of cards, built on disinformation would fall, once cannabis is readily available as medicine in its raw form. For one thing, there would be much more research done that is not based only on the attempt to prove harm (which is presently the only research that NIDA funds or allows). In spite of that, studies, such as the one by Dr. Donald Tashkin, showed that even chronic long term smokers of cannabis show no increased risk of lung cancer. It is only a matter of time that the weight of public opinion, and science finally ends the desperate attempt to retain funding for the failed "war on drugs".
Let's see, over many years of smoking (notice they don't say anything about eating) pot you can absolutely have many of the same side effects of tobacco use. Yet we allow tobacco.
On the other hand we allow Morphine to control pain. How about those side effects? Addiction, overdose, organ failure yet we allow Morphine. I don't see them saying the side effects of that aren't worth it yet they're far worse than the worst side effects of pot.
I note the age and inaccessibility of the documentation of the anti-pot side. Not unusual, almost required, since the honest science appraisals always come down on the side of medical marijuana, especially under controlled circumstances and intelligent use, whic would be with a Volcano vaporizer. We are suffering in the United States from our religious indoctrination of children, which leads to their acceptance, after they've grown up, of poor evidence for their beliefs. The current anti-science efforts by the theologists are reactive battles against evidence. They battle stem cells, evolution, evidence-based legislation because they are fearful of losing their status, wealth, and power as ultimate arbiters of behavior. God doesn't need money; she has all the power she needs. She gave us marijuana and the knowledge to use it for both mental and physical pain as we need it. It is shameful and sociologically destructive to ban personal choice in medicine. Get the God-nuts off our backs!
It is the prison guards and cops who would be laid off (were MJ legalized) who finance anti-cannabis lobbyists. They and the lawyers who would not be paid to defend the cannabis users or growers, it these groups (and many others) who fight against the truth about this wonderful medicine. I can continue to list the groups of people who benefit from the current legal status of cannabis who are not priests or ministers.
Cannabis has long been used in religious ceremonies. The Bible has no prohibition against it. The leaders of the American churches are just average Americans, who have been brain washed by anti-cannabis lies like all the rest of the nonchristians. Believing that their country is good and the laws just - they will give you the just say no talk. Or perhaps you might do some time in detox followed by Jesus boot camp.
I take time to educate everyone who will listen about the medical and other ways that cannabis is good food, good clothing, good medicine, good for the economy. It makes great rope also.
We need to educate everyone about cannabis. We need to organize and fight bad laws with the light of scientific research. I am a Christian who knows the truth about cannabis. See the difference??
clinton
I noticed a common thread in the responses I read. NOT WHEN SMOKED. A vaporizer would help alleviate concerns about "smoking" cannabis. Vision, do you work for a big pharmacuetical company? Your response certainly gives me that impression. I suppose in your world Marinol, and Sativex have tremenous medical value.
As soon as we get someone in the white house that will work for the American people and not corporations the truth will be told. I have years of personal research it helps insomnia, depression, chronic pain and many others and last week I saw a study that indicated regular use may reduce the chance of cancer. Go to the web stories of MJ helping a plethora of problems. But our Federal boys just will not give it up pushed by politicians who are financed by big business. They are afraid they might lose some bottom line. So the feds sacrifice us at the rate of one every 38 seconds, every day! I call it being put in jail for being Americans remember when they said you cannot have your alcohol? My dad drank and my grandfather drank it killed them both I rarely drink. Sell the farm make your bet! I do not advocate anyone taking drugs I say I will fight to insure your rights to make a personal decision as an adult. And if the majority vote and want it I will not vote to arrest you.
Cannabis,(marijuana) is schedule 1 Controled substance. One of the requirements for Schedule 1 is NO MEDICAL VALUE. If cannabis has enough medical value to be patented by the US Gov for medical use, how can it be a schedule 1 Controled substance? Something is very wrong here. Either the patents are bogus, or cannabis is no longer a schedule 1 controled substance. I'm soooooooo confused :)
If you spend a little time researching the internet you can find that the US government had it's own FEDERAL medical marijuana plan and at one time it had almost 70 members. Right now there are about four remaining patients who receive monthly marijuana shipments from the FEDERAL US medical marijuana program. I believe this was covered well in Penn and Teller's 'B*llsh*t' episode about the war on drugs . So ask yourself how the US government can ban the use of marijuana for medical use when they send it in the mail to patients who signed up for their own program?
Yes I am well aware of the program. There is a vid on this, can't remember where it is at the moment. One of the recipiannts is talking to a gov group of some kind. One of the things that he said was that he had never gotten "high" on the gov cannabis . This leads me to believe statements that I have heard stating that gov cannabis is extremely LOW quality. He also stated that the remaining members had been tested to see what harmfull affects the consumption of cannabis had had on them. The results of the test showed that there had been NO HARMFULL AFFECTS WHATSOEVER, NONE. I have personaly used cannabis oil to treat Basal Cell skin cancer SUCCESSFULLY. No medical value my ass.
The United States government is completely duplicitous when it comes to the medical efficacy of cannabis. On the one hand the DEA raids medical cannabis dispensaries and patients. On the other hand;
US Patent 6630507 titled "Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants" which is assigned to The United States of America, as represented by the Department of Health and Human Services.
How can the US so boldly lie about this issue while holding the above patent? How?!
I have Basal Cell Carcinoma. Basal Cell is a form of skin cancer. It is not considered particularly dangerous, although I have been told it could penitrate through my skin, into the flesh of my scalp, from there into my skull, and then into my brain. Well, it hasn't done that in over 25yrs so I'm not perticularly worried about it. I have had six surgerical procedures to remove lesions from my head, neck, and face. After the last surgery I decided I had had quite enough. I decided I would seek an alternative treatment method. After some very extensive searching I came to rest on Cannabis Oil. The treatment is utterly painless, safe beyond measure, and quite cheap compared to surgery. My lesions had been biopsied, and diagnosed by the Veterans Administration medical center, dermatology clinic in Dallas, Tx. I treated two rather prominent lesions with the cannabis oil. THEY ARE CURED, GONE, KAPUT, FINNISHED. I am living proof that compounds in the cannabis plant WILL CURE CANCER.
it's "legal" in my state. I pay the state $150 a year for that "permission slip" called the state issued card. I use it for glaucoma however I still use two different types of drops that help keep my pressures low. Using pot reduces the pressures in between the drops. It would be impractical to be stoned all the time. I also use it for a sleep aid but that was an unintended benefit. I've lost 30 lb. and my gout flare ups are down 90%. It's never killed anyone from an overdose however I almost died from a mistake made on a prescription lable and I had a terrible allergic reaction to Celebrex. So to you Drug Free America people.. Worry about the dangerous drugs.. the ones in your medicine cabinets! Leave my non-toxic drug alone.
recently my wife and I went to a BBQ get together. It started raining and everyone went inside. This was a LARGE house but everyone seemed to gather in this small entertainment room.(A TV, POOL TABLE and a Bar. There were joints lit and passed around. I passed when they were offered to me because its illegal in my State (TN) Even though I passed on the joints, I inhaled some of the smoke that was in the room. My wife and I left because we didnt want to be involved with any criminal activity. (I'm confined to a wheelchair with SPASTIC PARPERISIS) On the way home my wife said I was moving better. and I had the most restful sleep that night, More restfull than I have had in MANY years. I also woke with short term energy. Usually I just don't want to get out of bed for a while. I take the medication called Baclofen, wich releives my spastic muscles SOME. but with a GREAT AMOUNT OF FATIGUE.! I WANT Marijuana as a LEGAL medication. I didnt suffer any Side affects but a giggle.
Most people against medipot see only the negative aspects of the drug. Take a look at the benefits:
It's cheap: Anyone with a green thumb and no health insurance can easily produce it themselves WITHOUT paying out of the arse to a multinational pharmaceutical giant like UniMed (the makers of Marinol)
It's relatively non-addictive: Compared to other psychoactive painkillers, such as oxy-contin, cannabis is much easier to quit and causes far fewer negative effects id addiction does occur. Not to say that it isn't, but one has to compare to what's already available.
Vaporizers don't remove all the bad stuff, but they do remove a lot of it. Besides, it's perfectly legal for tobacco smokers to expose themselves to this all the time, yet some prohibitionists base their entire argument for continuing to use the long arm of the law against patients on this fairly insignificant fact. To this day, no one has ever been able to tie a single case of lung cancer directly to marijuana smoke or vapor
This issue is a tricky one to face because of the limited knowledge that the general public is readily offered about marijuana. There are many ways to ingest marijuana that are much safer than directly smoking it. There are also vaporizers that make smoking safer. While it is agreed that smoking anything is not in itself good, when facing the controversy over marijuana, it takes some research and knowledge.
It is my personal opinion that should you want to try it, it should be an option for you. There are many people that claim that it helps when other medicines do not. We cannot discount these claims.
There are many medicines in which the risks generally outweigh the benefit but these medicines are readily. In fact, as bad as alcohol is for a person, in moderation it has been shown to be beneficial. Why not view marijuana the same?
Let's get as much information as we can. Educate the public.
We can't move forward in this topic until we get past the stigma we have built around it.
This is almost a trick question because the answer could be yes or no, depending upon how one thinks of marihuana. There are beneficial molecules in the cannabis plant, just as there are beneficial molecules in the foxglove plant (digitalis) or the bark of the willow tree (salicylic acid or aspirin) or the leaves of the coca bush (cocaine). Important pharmaceutical drugs have copied, synthesized, and manufactured these molecules in pure and standardized doses that can be prescribed by practitioners and taken safely in recommended doses by patients to alleviate disease symptoms. The same is partially true for cannabis. At least two medicines whose active ingredient was derived from cannabis have been approved by the FDA and are in medical use today. Many more are in the pipeline, including some that will provide the benefits of the cannabis plant without the unwanted psychic side effect. Those who abuse cannabis, however, are not likely to appreciate cannabinoid medicines without the tr
It has long been acknowledged that pushing marijuana for medical use could open the doors for full legalisation of all drugs, under the same banner. At a conference to push this agenda it was clear the public would be manipulated emotionally,unless educated re. the cost to the unborn where a parent is using and the behavioural and physical changes that take place following use.
Marijuana has never been passed as a medicine by the World Health Organisation,despite being researched many times.
Marijuana lowers the immune system when people need it most during illness.
Its use causes both physical disease and mental illness.People who are ill need the best available health care both medical and through natural methods e.g. the food they eat etc.
Marijuana is a poor suggestion for health care. We need to provide the best. It is not. There are far better alternatives.Dont be manipulated
Aisling Group International, Ireland
that marijuana lowers the immune system (please link evidence to this claim) then why do doctors primarily prescribe it for patients who belong to the highest risk groups for compromised immune systems (ie people who have cancer or are under going chemotherapy and HIV / AIDS patients)?
People going through chemotherapy are told that changing the cat litter box can risk their life (due to their reduced natural immunity to toxoplasmosis) so why on earth would a doctor give them access to something that would further damage their immune system?
I am a medical cannabis patient, and I am living proof that cannabis does have medical uses. I used to have to take 31 pills per day for my myriad medical and psychiatric problems, and now am down to two types of insulin and a cannabis-laced chocolate truffle once per day. I no longer have to deal with the horrible side effects of the prescription drugs prescribed to me by Western doctors , and am no longer spending weeks at a time in hospital recovering from symptoms of autoimmune diseases that are the result of an OVERactive immune system and side effects and drug interactions from all of my prescriptions. Your assertion that " marijuana lowers the immune system" would be a positive in my case if it were true. "It causes..mental illness"? It has alleviated the symptoms of my mental illnesses(anxiety and PTSD)to allow me to be a productive member of society . In fact, even while I was using Western medicine , I was eating a diet prescribed by my Homeopath and endorsed by my Acupuncturist, and both did not see any improvement in my health until I switched from Western medicines to medical cannabis. I challenge you to show me a better alternative to this one medicine that works and is not causing any ill effects in my body, life, or relationships. I am healthier now than I have been in years, and am no longer afraid of dying VERY young.
ALL drugs should be legalized. If it is not blaringly obvious that MJ prohibition is even a more dismal failure than alcohol prohibition..well, you can't say much to the willfully blind & ignorant.
Why should all drugs be legalized? To take control of them. To take the profit motive away from the drug cartels. To take the 'forbidden fruit' aspect away & lessen the curiosity factor. After all curiosity is the real gate way to drugs, not cannabis use. To save lives. If it were not for the prohibition that has given rise to the drug cartels a lot of people would still be alive.
Cannabis should be out right legal. All other drugs should also be legal, only about 2% of the population are addicts any way.(More die because of prohibition than die from illegal drug use . Rx drugs are even worse for causing death. Thank the cartels & stupid burrocrates.) The 2% population addiction rate has been steady for years. Check out Law Enforcement Against Prohibition's web site. Drugs should be legal, quality controlled & affordable. They should be dispensed legally & linked to factual education regarding the potential affects. Government would not have to lie about the dangers of crack, X, meth, heroine & so on the way they have to lie about cannabis. Plus we could sure use the $$!!
I am not going to address each of you comments. They show you have not done a good job of research. To me it appears you are just parroting what you have heard others say & have not bothered to check out the claims yourself.
I am not manipulated. Rather it seems that you have been.
SamFox
Cannabis (marijuana is slang) is being used by twice as many people today than just after John Howard did his zero tolerance speech, that is called rebellion and that is what prohibition brings about. Secondly all drugs should be controlled as it is right now exactly what control does our government have over any of the so called illicit drugs, given by their own reports they get around 10% of all the illicit drugs, now by my reckoning that says they have no control over 90%. Now by anyone's figures that is not control.
Cannabis does not lower the immune system it in fact protects it as is now well known by researchers around the world in fact since we have already THC in our body and brain, have CBD receptors in all vital areas our bodies, they are there for a reason and now the researchers know why, we need Cannabis to help the body to mend itself, protect us against the nasties out there including cancer, Alzheimer's, in fact so far most mental illness and most cancer, however if by some chance we get these nasties Cannabis cures them and so much more.
Cannabis does not cause mental illness even the latest Government reports now admit this fact.
It has never caused physical disease and has never killed anyone or anything in recorded history.
You state that people who are ill need the best available medical and natural well guess what the medical want to do just that, however you wont let them and this is one of the most natural Plants and medicines known to mankind and has been used in all traditional medicine for thousands of years and even the bible backs this up as do what is left of the ancient herbal treatment manuscripts that have survived the destruction by the Catholic church attempting to stop people being healed by anyone or anything other than a priest of the church.
People including many you know need this medicine, please take your own advice and do not be manipulated do your own research.
Promoting the notion of so-called ‘safe smoking of cannabis’ is a quite misleading and potentially harmful action – with an erroneous message, very similar to the one promoted to have people smoke tobacco to relieve symptoms of stress and other illnesses, by tobacco ‘experts’ some 20 years ago.
World experts including the American Academy of Ophthalmology advise that existing pharmaceutical drugs provide satisfactory treatment for patients suffering glaucoma, cancers, nausea, wasting syndrome and multiple sclerosis.
The Therapeutic Goods Administration has not endorsed marijuana to be a safe drug for consumption in any form.
The Australian Medical Association has issued warnings on the health risks associated with smoking marijuana, including memory loss, psychosis, hallucinations, asthma, and lung cancer. Studies have found that cannabis drivers have a 7 times greater risk of fatal accidents.
Lots of other medical associations & groups have endorsed MMJ. Another poster put up a list.
You listed one of the reasons medical cannabis stays illegal, Rx drugs . How about a list of the side affects of your list of Rx drugs? The Rx drug makers are afraid they will lose $ if cannabis were RE-legalized.
Smoke bad? Get a vaporizer.
Medical cannabis is NOT a misnomer. If it were we would not be advocating it's RE- legalization . Those of us who fear the Rx drug side affects know that MMJ works. Besides, the RE-legalize movement is not about getting any one else to start using medical cannabis. It IS about letting us as individuals & States have the ability to choose for ourselves. Why cannot we be allowed to choose a substance that you cannot die from using over Rx drugs "whose side affects may include" our death?
Look up the persecution of MMJ patients like Angel Raich.
SamFox
Cannabis has controlled my asthma since 1968. It has provided a 25% reduction in my intraoccular pressure as my Ophthalmologist will attest, since my glaucoma diagnosis eight years ago.
And I like it. Deal with that.