cannabisnews.com: Bill: Marijuana OK for Pain Relief





Bill: Marijuana OK for Pain Relief
Posted by CN Staff on April 04, 2003 at 18:13:02 PT
By Matthew Wrye, Staff Writer
Source: Maneater
If a proposed bill passes, people in Missouri would have the right to use marijuana if they’ve exhausted the use of pain relief medicine for the effects of cancer, glaucoma, AIDS and other diseases. The bill to legalize marijuana for such patients was introduced March 13 in the Missouri House of Representatives and is awaiting further discussion. It would acknowledge marijuana as acceptable for medical use in Missouri by classifying the drug as a Schedule II Substance, lowering it from its current Schedule I classification, which prohibits using it as medicine by the Drug Enforcement Administration in 42 states. 
“I’ve spoken and heard from numerous people for whom the drug works,” said Rep. Vicki Walker, R-Kansas City and sponsor of the bill. “For most of these patients, this is the last thing they try because it is illegal.” Addiction to the active agent in marijuana, THC, is a point of debate, said Stanley Watson, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Michigan. “There are no convincing studies that marijuana is very addicting,” Watson said. “Of course it is possible that a patient might like the brain effects and decide to keep using it.” Watson and a team of professors and doctors from around the country reviewed scientific evidence of using THC and marijuana as medicine and published their findings in 1999 under the Institute of Medicine. “There’s fairly little good clinical information about actual cannabis compound being used for medical treatment,” Watson said. “What’s really missing is good organized data. It needs more study.” Yet Watson said there’s no reliable data to support the idea that marijuana is bad medical treatment. The drug relieves pain and provides symptom relief for some people, he said. However, he said marijuana might take a toll on health because smoking it is similar to smoking tobacco, he said. “Do I know of anything that marijuana is good at that other medicines aren’t? Not really,” Watson said. “Maybe the way out of this is not to be testing marijuana itself but chemical compounds.” The Food and Drug Administration’s rules for medical treatment, which don’t accept marijuana as a legitimate treatment, make a base for drug use rules in most countries around the world, said Will Glaspy, spokesman for the DEA. “The question that needs to be asked is, are we going to abandon that system for a system that is based essentially on the ideas of lobbyists,” Glaspy said. Glaspy said reports on studies of marijuana done by the IOM and American Medical Association are usually twisted by marijuana initiative lobbyists, whose goal is legalization of all drugs. But that isn’t Walker’s reason for sponsoring the bill, she said. “For me,” Walker said, “this bill is a humanitarian bill that only seeks to help ease the pain of so many who cannot get relief elsewhere.” The bill is currently in a health committee but not on the committee’s calendar for discussion. In Columbia, a proposition on the ballot for the April 8 municipal elections would decriminalize the use of marijuana for medical reasons. Missouri House of Representatives: http://www.house.state.mo.usNewshawk: The GCWSource: Maneater, The (Columbia, MO Edu)Author: Matthew Wrye, Staff WriterPublished: April 1, 2003Copyright: 2003 The ManeaterContact: forum themaneater.comWebsite: http://www.themaneater.com/Related Articles & Web Site:Medical Marijuana Information Linkshttp://freedomtoexhale.com/medical.htmFederal Official Issues Pot Warning http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15868.shtmlPot Initiative Draws Federal Attention http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread15864.shtml 
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Comment #6 posted by Virgil on April 05, 2003 at 09:32:07 PT
GCW in comment5
The DEA is responsible for the Classification of substances on the schedule. While it really will take an act of Congress to correct the misclassification of cannabis, the DEA could change by themselves. It is within their juristiction just like when they moved Marinol from schedule 2 to schedule 3. I really wonder where it belongs. It is either a schedule 3 or 4 substance and if reality would prevail it is probably a schedule 4. In the schedule of narcotics 2,3,,4,and 5 ae=re deemed to have medical value. If it has a high potential for abuse, it is schedule 2. If it has a medium potential for abuse, it is schedule 3. If it has a low potential for abuse, it is schedule 4. If it has the lowest potential for abuse, it is schedule 5.I can see a schedule 3 classification on the basis of popularity, just because people chose cannabis because it is safe and 10% of the population already use it even if it is on an occassional basis like myself. On a percentage basis, it seems like it would have to be a schedule 4. Of course this all assumes you are being rational in the term of abuse and don't automatically revert to the Cult language of use is abuse.
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Comment #5 posted by The GCW on April 05, 2003 at 05:31:53 PT
This article confronts the schedule 1- LIE!
"...acknowledge marijuana as acceptable for medical use in Missouri by classifying the drug as a Schedule II Substance, lowering it from its current Schedule I classification,..."I THOUGHT ONLY CONGRESS could change the schedule... Schedule 1 claims cannabis has no medical value. TRUTH IS, cannabis DOES have medical value! 2 examples of that are Marinol and Raphael Mechoulam of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and GW Pharmaceuticals. It is something to mention to congressmen when You write to tell them to get in line - to sign.As I understand it, congress is the bunch that has the power to change the schedule and so is where We must direct Our attention.That may be the same bunch We must contact, in order to say We disagree with the Federal jar heads, tampering with the availability of Hemp products, which is again on Our radar screens.
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Comment #4 posted by afterburner on April 04, 2003 at 21:09:33 PT:
FDA, Unelected Bureaucrats, Try to Rule the World.
The Food and Drug Administration's rules for medical treatment, which don't accept marijuana as a legitimate treatment, make a base for drug use rules in most countries around the world, said Will Glaspy, spokesman for the DEA. "The question that needs to be asked is, are we going to abandon that system for a system that is based essentially on the ideas of lobbyists," Glaspy said.Worldwide prohibition is motivated by a group of US bureaucrats, not elected by WE THE PEOPLE. The real question is: does the USA, which claims to promote DEMOCRACY around the world, really believe in DEMOCRACY enough to listen to its own people, WE THE PEOPLE, who are overwhelmingly in favor of allowing chronically ill or dying people to use medical cannabis? I am not a lobbyist: no one pays me one red-white-and-blue cent to inform the public of the truth about cannabis, the truth that has been buried alive by political propaganda, obfuscation, and junk science. The gall of these unelected non-representative bureaucrats with their holier-that-thou attitides! ego destruction or ego transcendence, that is the question.And as the elders of our time choose to remain blind -
Let us rejoice and let us sing and dance and ring in the new -
Hail Atlantis!Donovan Lyrics :: 105 LYRICS AVAILABLE!!
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/d/donovan/lyrics.htm
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Comment #3 posted by freedom fighter on April 04, 2003 at 20:14:16 PT
I can see now
why fed the clowns been hoppin mad over the "local" issue down at Columbia Missouri..“There are no convincing studies that marijuana is very addicting,” Watson said. “Of course it is possible that a patient might like the brain effects and decide to keep using it.” hapazff
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Comment #2 posted by Virgil on April 04, 2003 at 19:25:14 PT
A similar paragraph to comment1
Now that the mainstream press is under attack for propaganda and lies that we have seen with a cannabis perspective quite clearly, they are analyzing the situation. This following paragraph is written in review of a recent Bill Krystol article. It is highly similar to the words of RC in comment1.From http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2003/04/tomasky-m-04-02.html But legitimate debate means nothing to these people. Only partisan advantage does. The point is to scare the other side, club it into submission, and you do that by setting up a phony argument and repeating it over and over. And, tragically, it works. That's the fun thing about being in the Ministry of Truth: If you say it, it's true. That's the propaganda part. Now for the lie. 
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Comment #1 posted by Virgil on April 04, 2003 at 18:35:10 PT
Richard Cowan has the paragraph of the day
In his Friday commentary at marijuananews.com, Richard Cowan has given the cannabis informational junkie something of supreme creation. It is a leap that adds an incriminating light on our unfriends, the prohibitionist.RC list some qualities of a cult and calls the prohibitionist establishment a cult- http://www.marijuananews.com/news.php3?sid=659 It is a bookmark article that needs promotion around the web and contains the following poetic paragraph. This paragraph is on the marijuananews.com homepage in the introduction and not in the commentary itself.Official statements of blatantly irrational positions that fly in the face of observable facts are not made in order to convince anyone, but rather to engender a sense of hopelessness in those who suspect the truth and disorientation among those who do not.
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