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The Need To Legalize Pot
The Need To Legalize Pot The Need To Legalize Pot Just in, California has become the first state to legalize pot! Unfortunately, for all you proud owners of a two-foot-bong or a three-inch bowl, you must have a prescription from a medical doctor before you light up. Perhaps it's only a crack in the ice, but it is a start to a long-awaited, controversial issue that needs to be touched upon again. In the fall of 1996, Proposition 215 was passed in California, legalizing the medical use of marijuana. Even though the majority (56%) voted to pass 215, opponents plan to continue to fight the measure. It was also so in Arizona, where Proposition 200, the Drug Medicalization, Prevention, and Control Act, won 65% of the vote. It says that Arizona's doctors can prescribe marijuana, heroin, and LSD for patients when there is "medicinal value" (California 62). The passing of these two propositions has also helped the release of prisoners convicted of drug possession (---). With jail capacity already overflowing, if you were to lock up a dealer, you therefore create a job opening. Bob Randall, president of the Alliance for the Cannabis Therapeutics, a Washington-based patients' right group, says as many as five-million sick Americans might benefit from the legal access to marijuana. Marijuana has been found to: relieve nausea and stimulate appetite in people with cancer and AIDS, control muscle spasms among people with multiple sclerosis and other neurological disorder, reduce eye pressure among people with glaucoma, and some say it also controls seizures, eases chronic pain, and relieves depression. Dr. Ernest Rosenbaum, a San Francisco cancer specialist, says he and many doctors quietly recommend marijuana to patients who didn't respond to other medications. A 1991 Harvard study found that about 40 % of cancer specialists surveyed had recommended marijuana to relieve chemotherapy nausea, and about 48% said they would prescribe the drug if it were made legal. An article was written in the October, 28, 1996 Time issue about a former police commissioner, Jo Daly, who was diagnosed with colon cancer. Jo started chemotherapy for her cancer, but the side effects included "nuclear implosion." Then came a burning pain under the nails of her toes and fingers. The good news was that she eventually found relief. The bad news was that it came from marijuana. Daly tried Marinol, a substitute the FDA approved as a synthetic version of THC (marijuana's psychoactive ingredient), without success before she ended up turning to pot. Even after the positive results and outcomes of patients using marijuana, not everyone is in favor of legalizing the drug. Some people are still uptight about the whole issue of legalizing marijuana and continue to set aside the benefits of pot. "This proposition is not about medicine," charges Orange County Sheriff Brad Gates, co-chairman of Citizens for a Drug-Free California, the campaign opposing Prop. 215. "It's about the legalization of marijuana" (36). Well, wake up, America! There are far more benefits from the drug then just medical. Making the drug legally available, with tight regulatory controls, would end the black market and with it, much of the violence; legalization would reduce the number of people in prison, which in turn would reduce the government budget...This is ONLY a preview of the article. If you would like to view the entire document, you must subscribe to Electronic References. Please register below now! Get This Full Article After Registration
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